I Beg Your Pardon, Potter?
by Riyan
Summary: Harry asks Malfoy on a date. On a dare. What's the worst that could happen? (Rated M for possible language later.) Story originally posted 2007-2010, reworked and republished. Set post OoTP, pre/instead of HBP. AU I guess. Updated (hopefully) every 2 weeks.
1. Chapter 1

This story was originally published from 2007-2010 before I removed it around 2012. Recently, I decided to rework it and republish it.

DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

* * *

"I beg your pardon, Potter?" It was lunchtime and Harry Potter had just asked Draco Malfoy out on a date.

"I asked you out, Malfoy." It had been a dare from Seamus.

"I think I will go with," Draco paused, squinting at Harry, incredulous at even being asked. "No."

"Oh good," Harry said, breathing a sigh of relief. "I was hoping you'd say that."

"Well, then why the bloody hell did you ask?"

"It was a dare."

"Oh."

"See you around, Malfoy!" and Harry skipped away, while Malfoy frowned after him.

...

Later that night, Draco lay in his bed, staring at the velvety green canopy of his four poster bed. He was thinking back to how Harry had asked him out. He'd half considered saying yes. Hell, why not? It would have been a laugh. But then he'd have had to kiss Harry and he didn't really want to do that. (Did he?)

But it had been a dare anyway, so it didn't matter. He was glad it was a dare. He didn't like Pothead that way. He didn't like him at all come to think of it. It would have been awkward if it hadn't been a dare though. They would have had to get through all the sexual tension in Potions where they _always_ seemed to be paired together. It was like Snape had a secret, or not so secret, sadistic side and he _enjoyed_ watching them torment each other. As much as Draco admired the Potions Master, he sure creeped him out.

…

Sure enough, the next day:

"Malfoy, go with Potter and see if you can bring out the hidden Potions skills that may be lurking somewhere inside his thick skull," Snape said in his oily voice. Draco wondered idly if he practiced making his voice sound that way so that it would match his hair. Then he wondered if Snape would sound different if he washed his hair.

"Great," Draco huffed as he sat down heavily beside Harry. "You again." Harry grinned at him.

"Don't worry," the black haired boy said. "I won't ask you out again. What potion are we making?" Draco frowned and consulted the board.

"Uh," he said. "Dreamless Sleep Potion."

"Cool."

"No," Draco corrected. "Not cool. Difficult." Harry frowned for a moment, then a grin spread across his face.

"But I've got _you_ as my partner! You're _good_ at Potions!" Harry said, enthusiastically.

"What is wrong with you, Potter? Are you high?" Draco asked. Harry shook his head and giggled. "Drunk then?" Harry looked around to make sure that no one had heard what Draco had said and nodded quickly. Then he giggled again. Well, that explained a lot. "Were you drunk yesterday when you asked me out?" Harry nodded again.

"And I was dared," he said.

" _I know that_."

"Ooh, touched a nerve, did I?" Harry teased.

"No," Draco snapped. "Now start reading out the ingredients." Harry sighed and turned to the correct page in his book.

"Frogspawn. Corcoran weed. A bunny foot. Some water-"

"How much water?"

"A liter and a half. Winter sage. Red rose petals…" and the list went on. Harry grew more and more bored with reading them out, so he invented some of his own ingredients and swapped them around with the ones that they were given. Just for kicks and giggles. Because at the end of the day - who really cared? Harry didn't. At that moment, Harry didn't really care about anything.

"Bigglesworth weed?" Draco asked. Harry looked up and nodded. "Does it really say to use that?"

"Yeah, duh."

"Okay," he said and went off to the store cupboard and came back with the plant. "Anything else?" he asked once he'd put it on the table. Harry shook his head. "Alright, what are the instructions?" And Harry began to make them up.

"First, you chop up the caterpillars and throw them in the boiling water."

"So I should boil the water?"

"Yes. Also finely dice the mint, the rose petals and the winter sage leaves and mix them together." Harry thought vaguely that _he_ should be the new Potions Master. He was good at making up new potions. He would have to remember this one. "Are you making notes?" he asked. Draco looked up from the caterpillars he was chopping. He hadn't let Harry help with the slicing as he was worried Harry would cut himself in his current state of intoxication.

"What?"

"On the procedure. Are you making notes? Snape said to make notes."

"But I can just look it up in the book."

"But you learn better when you write it down. It's a new rule." Harry nodded sagely. The effect was spoiled by his slightly unfocussed eyes.

"So, why are you writing it down?" Draco asked. He was damned if he was going to do _all_ the work for this lesson. Potter had better do something other than read.

"Because you're going to,"

"But," Draco spluttered.

"Please?" Harry batted his eyelashes and tried to look endearing.

"No." Harry frowned by picked up his quill and some parchment. He could at least doodle and _look_ like he was taking notes.

"Then after the caterpillars, uh, add the Bigglesworth weed. One leaf at a time. That's the important bit." Draco did what he said and small blue sparks were observed on the surface of the water. They jotted that down.

"Now add two drops of resazurin." This one was at least on the instructions. A color change occurred. The potion turned pink. Harry made a note. And then a doodle. He'd actually managed to write down most of his procedure so far, which surprised him.

"Stir it clockwise."

"How many times?"

"Two." The potion began to glow. "Now add the rose petals with the mint and the winter sage. The ones that we chopped up earlier." The glowing stopped and the potion turned a deep purple. "Add the frogspawn now and stir it five times anticlockwise." The purple darkened to black and then turned bright orange.

"Are you sure we're doing this right?" Draco asked. "Everyone else's potions are blue."

"Yes," Harry snapped. "Just give it a minute and add the bunny foot." And sure enough, the potion turned blue. Harry was proud of himself. He had no idea what he was doing, but he was doing a good job. Draco sighed in relief. He ran a shaky hand through his hair, leaving it slightly mussed up, then stared at Harry expectantly. Harry stared back.

"The potion?" Draco asked eventually. "What do we do next?"

"Right," Harry said. "Add the Corcoran weed. Emphatically. Like throw it in with gusto." Draco dropped the Corcoran weed into the cauldron. "That wasn't particularly emphatic," Harry muttered.

"So sue me."

"Slowly drop in the silver nitrate. Good. Now add the dragonfly wings one at a time, and then we're done. Oh, wait. No. Stir it four times clockwise and then once anticlockwise." Draco did and the potion glowed silver for a moment before settling down to a pretty turquoise color, which was surprisingly similar to the color of the rest of the class's potions.

Harry grinned to himself and continued to write everything down on his piece of parchment. It was also covered in doodles of snitches and broomsticks and Malfoy and hearts and oh no. He'd drawn Malfoy on a piece of parchment that Malfoy might see. Damn. He rested his head resignedly on his hand and sighed. He was almost too drunk to care. He scribbled down the last of his instructions and prayed that it was legible so that he could remember the potion in the morning.

"Potter," Draco said sharply. Harry sat up straight and tried to look attentive. "Why have you drawn me on your parchment?"

"That's not you," Harry said. "That's someone else."

"No, it's definitely me. You've added my initials."

"No, this person is Daniel, uh, Longbottom Miller. Yes. That's who that is." Harry nodded quickly. "He just happens to also have blond hair and a smirk."

"Not buying it. Why have you drawn me?" Draco asked again.

"Uh, so that I can use it in my ritual burning of your effigies?"

"Oh?"

"Yes, it's held once a month, on the Astronomy tower, during the full moon. I dance around naked and burn all the pictures I've drawn - er - that I _have_ of you."

"Wait, drawing me is a common thing?"

"Only, so that I can burn your effigies," Harry retorted.

"But that makes no sense."

"Doesn't it?"

"No?"

"Aha! Uncertainty!" Harry seized upon it like a drowning man to a raft. He didn't want Malfoy to think he _liked_ him. Gosh no. Even if it _was_ true. "You want to say it makes sense, because it _does_. It definitely does. I hate you, so I draw you in order to burn your likeness. I hate you so much that I take that _extra effort_ to burn you. To, uh, show my hate."

Draco rolled his eyes. "You're so special." Harry beamed.

"I know!" he exclaimed. "I'm the Boy-Who-Lived!"

"No, as in, 'don't eat the snargaluff pod' special," Harry frowned.

"Yeah? Well, you're gay." He hadn't meant to say it. It just came out. And really, Harry didn't think there was anything wrong with it. In fact, there were lots of things right with it. But it seemed like something Malfoy didn't want people to know and now Harry was using this against him. He hated himself for it.

"Who told you?" Draco muttered, so quietly that Harry almost didn't hear it.

"No one," Harry said, and he meant it. "I have special powers."

"Yeah, we all do, Potter. It's called _magic_ ," Malfoy snapped.

"No," Harry said. He wanted to fix the conversation. He wanted it to go back to the easy banter they'd had before. "I mean, I can tell when people are like me." He twiddled his thumbs and looked at the floor. He half expected a sneered retort to do with him being a "speccy git" or something along those lines. When Draco didn't say anything, Harry looked up. The blond boy was looking at him thoughtfully.

"So, when you asked me out, it _could_ have been real?" he asked eventually. Harry blinked at him.

"Well," he said slowly. "It _could have_ , except for the fact that it was you, and I'm supposed- and I hate you." He looked pointedly back down at the floor again.

"If you hate me so much, why have you been brewing a love potion?" Draco asked, bending down so that he could look Harry in the eyes.

"Have I _really_ been brewing a love potion?" Harry's eyes brightened and he grinned.

"Yeah, I thought you knew that. I just went along with it because…" he paused for rather too long. "I thought it might be fun to make." An awkward silence fell. Harry wasn't sure where to look, but couldn't bring himself to look at Draco and so picked up his quill again and doodled another snitch on the corner of his parchment.

"Screw it," he said, putting his quill down with a thud on the table. Draco looked up. "Go out with me. Just one date. Why not?"

"Okay."

"Okay?" Harry asked, thrown for a moment by the calm tone of Draco's acceptance.

"Yes, okay. Though, Potter, I don't quite know why I'm agreeing to this."

"Because I'm amazing. I thought that was obvious," Harry said.

"Right," Draco said slowly. He had the horrible feeling he was making a huge mistake, but, as Harry had said, screw it. It couldn't hurt to try. After all - what was the worst that could happen?


	2. Chapter 2

This story was originally published from 2007-2010 before I removed it around 2012. Recently, I decided to rework it and republish it.

DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

* * *

The note landed on Draco's desk in the middle of Transfiguration the next day.

 _Dear Mr. Malfoy,_ it read. _Would you like to go to Hogsmeade with me tonight. For our date. First date even. Wow. Whoops, this is a formal invitation. Please let me know. Sincerely, Harry_.

The 'formal' note was bordered by a flurry of broomsticks and golden snitches. Harry had a serious doodling problem. He looked up and glanced around the room surreptitiously. Harry was grinning at him from across the classroom. When Draco caught his eye, Harry flashed him an excited thumbs up. Draco buried his head in his hands, then picked up his quill and scribbled a note back, taking care _not_ to doodle on the margins.

 _How will we get there on a school night?_ He used his wand to make the note scuttle along the floor back to Harry, who read his message and smirked. Draco had never seen Harry smirk before. Before he could process Harry's mischievous grin and how that made him feel, he saw the note slide its way back onto the desk in front of him.

 _I have my ways_ , it read. Draco frowned at the note, and then looked up and frowned at Harry who shrugged, still smirking. The smirk made Draco's insides feel like liquid. He pushed those feelings down and concentrated on the note.

 _Fine_ , he wrote. He tried to come up with something other than a one word answer, but his brain failed him. Just before sending the note back he scribbled, _where shall I meet you? Oh, and when?_

 _By the statue of the humpback, one eyed witch on the third floor. 7pm. Don't be late._ After this, Harry had doodled a winking face. Draco did not know what to make of the wink. He looked up and nodded at Harry.

They spent the rest of the lesson ignoring each other. Sort of.

…

Seven o'clock rolled around all too quickly. Draco was panicking. His shirt didn't match his socks, but all of his clothed were mysteriously in the wash. He suspected foul play on the part of Zabini. The git. Hopefully Harry wouldn't notice his socks. He didn't expect to be removing his trousers in Hogsmeade, and that would really be the only way in which they might show. So he should be fine.

Plus, it was not as if Potter appreciated those kinds of things anyway.

Not for the first time, Draco wondered what he had gotten himself into. He wasn't sure, and there was no time to think about it now.

…

Harry ran a hand through his hair, then flattened it back down once he realized how much that made it stick up. He was nervous and Draco was late. What on earth had possessed him to ask Malfoy out for real? Why couldn't he have just lusted after him from afar? Damn Seamus and his spiked pumpkin juice. And his dares. He really should have been more suspicious of the sharp taste in his pumpkin juice the second morning Seamus had spiked it. But it was too late to turn back now. He'd brewed a love potion and asked Malfoy out. He might as well lust after him from close by while he had the opportunity. Who knew, maybe something would come of it.

Harry twisted his scarf in his hands. What was taking Draco so long? He chewed his lip for a moment, then went back to twisting the scarf.

And then there he was, sauntering down the corridor in that sexy way that he always did. Except, it was a bit stilted this time, as if he were nervous too. But that couldn't be the case, could it?

Harry raised his hand in greeting, then put it quickly down again, feeling silly.

"Er, hi," he said, as Draco drew up beside him.

"Hello," Draco said. They stood there for a moment, neither of them saying something, before Draco turned back in the direction of the Grand Staircase. Harry grabbed his arm and spun him around. "Huh?" Draco asked, confused. "Did I not kiss you hello or something?" Harry blushed.

"No, you didn't but-" Before Harry could finish his sentence, Draco leaned in a pecked Harry quickly on the cheek. Now they were both flushed with embarrassment. "Uh, thanks. But, I was just trying to say you were going the wrong way."

"Oh," Draco said, staring down at his feet. "Right. Yes. Well, lead the way then." Harry pulled him closer and swung a silvery piece of material around them, covering them from head to toe. "What's this, Potter?"

"Invisibility cloak," Harry muttered. Draco's mouth fell open in shock.

"You have-" he started.

"-Yes," Harry interrupted. "Stop asking questions." He turned and dragged Draco over to the statue. Draco shuffled along next to him, trying very hard to stay under the cloak. Harry pulled out his wand and tapped the hump of the statue and whispered a spell that Draco couldn't hear. Clearly Harry did not trust him with this secret passageway and Draco couldn't really blame him. Draco had all but gotten Harry and all of his friends expelled for being in Dumbledore's Army last year. He shuddered as he remembered his time on the Inquisitorial Squad. His father had made him join so that he could make inroads at the Ministry. But Umbridge was gone this year and Draco was grateful for that.

In front of him, the witch's hump opened to reveal a chute, and he banished all thoughts of home and last year and how much of an ass he had been to Harry from his head.

"Cool," Draco said, looking at the chute.

"Good, now get in." Draco rolled his eyes and climbed into the hole. Harry waited until he heard the muffled flump of landing before climbing in himself and closing the hump.

As fate would have it, it did not occur to Draco to move after he landed at the bottom of the chute, so Harry ended up barreling into him. They both fell to the ground, Harry on top of Malfoy.

"Well this is moving faster than anticipated," the blond said. "Was this your plan? Take me to a dark place and ravish me?" Harry rolled off of Malfoy.

"It's too early in the date for this much physical contact," he said.

"So that wasn't your plan," Draco said, standing up and dusting off his robes. "Did you instead plan to kidnap me in the hopes you could lure Voldemort out of hiding to kill him? Because that won't work. No one gives a shit about me."

" _No_ ," Harry said, shaking dirt off of the invisibility cloak. "My plan was us to go to the Three Broomsticks for a drink. If you would prefer kidnapping or ravishing, or indeed, kidnapping _and_ ravishing, that can be arranged later. First," he started off down the passageway, pointing in the direction he was walking. "To Honeydukes." He tripped over an uneven patch in the floor, cursed and then lit his wand. Draco smirked and followed, lighting his own wand to join Harry's.

They walked for a few minutes in silence and gradually fell into step with each other. Draco was looking around at the passageway in interest.

"Who built this?" he asked. Harry shrugged. Their hands brushed as Draco looked up at a particularly large tree root that descended from the ceiling and accidentally walked into Harry. They both looked quickly at each other before looking away again. Harry felt like a twelve year old girl he was so full of nerves. He was half tempted to giggle nervously, but wisely refrained from doing so.

"How long does it take to get there?" Draco asked after they had been walking for about five minutes.

"Erm," Harry said, struggling to remember. The last time he had taken this passage was in his third year, and he'd taken it at a run because, speak of the devil, Malfoy had spotted him in Hogsmeade. "Forty five minutes?" he hazarded. Draco stopped walking.

"Seriously?" he asked. Harry nodded and Draco frowned. "I have an idea," he said after a moment's pause.

"And what's that?" Harry asked, trying hard to keep the sarcastic tone from his voice and failing.

"Why don't we fly?" Draco asked.

"I'm pretty sure there are security wards around the school. We can't just fly-"

"-No, you idiot," Draco snapped, interrupting him. "We should fly down this corridor. Or is it too narrow for you? Jeez, Potter, I thought you were good at Quidditch."

"Damn it, Malfoy. You're right. I hate it when you're right." Harry turned around and sprinted back down the passageway towards Hogwarts. Draco rolled his eyes but followed at a run.

Once they were back on the third corridor, they each went to their respective dorms to get their broomsticks. They met back at the statue about fifteen minutes later and Harry opened up the passage way again. They dropped their broomsticks down and then slid down the chute, one at a time. Draco considered not moving so that Harry would land on him, but it had actually been quite painful and he wasn't _that_ desperate to touch Harry.

"So which one is yours?" Harry asked, gesturing at the two Firebolts that lay next to each other on the floor of the tunnel. Draco shrugged.

"Dunno," he said. "Does it matter?"

"I guess for now it doesn't," Harry said. "But I do want to figure it out at some point. Mine has emotional significance." He tried to keep his voice level as a pang of sadness shot through him. He pushed his emotions down and held out a hand. One of the broomsticks shot up and he caught it and mounted it. "Race you," he cried, zooming down the passageway, leaving Draco cursing behind him.


	3. Chapter 3

This story was originally published from 2007-2010 before I removed it around 2012. Recently, I decided to rework it and republish it.

DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

* * *

It was a testament to Draco's flying ability that he was able to catch up to Harry. The passage was not the most ideal place to fly and they had to duck and weave around tree roots and corners. Harry knew, of course, that Draco was a decent Quidditch player - he'd played him enough times to know that - but he had never noticed how well the Slytherin handled the broom. Seamus's voice popped into his head unbidden.

"I wonder what else he rides well," it said. Dirty thoughts were always thought in Seamus's voice in Harry's mind. Color flooded his face and he was very glad that the passageway was so dark. Not that Draco could see his face, as the blond was flying behind him, but still. He suddenly became very self conscious as he realized that Draco could very well be staring at his butt.

And then suddenly, they were there. Harry slowed to a halt and clambered off of his broom. He propped it against the wall and Draco did the same. Then Harry swung the invisibility cloak around them again and they made their way up the stairs that led to the trapdoor. Once they reached it, Harry lifeted it cautiously and moved it to the side. They crept out into the darkened cellar of Honeydukes, staying as much under the cloak as they could. Harry replaced the trapdoor and Draco stared around with wide eyes.

"Wow," he breathed softly. Harry grinned.

They moved stealthily towards the stairs that led to the main area of the shop, occasionally stepping on each others' feet and muttering apologies. They shop was closed for the night, but they alohamora'ed the door open and crept out into the village.

Half past seven and the village of Hogsmeade was quiet. Most families had gone in for the night, but as they neared The Three Broomsticks, the noise level picked up. Light from the door spilled out onto the cobblestones outside the door, turning them temporarily orange as one of the patrons left for his or her home.

"Ah, the pub," Draco said. "Planning on getting me drunk then, Potter?"

"Curses," Harry replied, frowning. "You saw through my _incredibly_ cunning plan." Draco smirked and hit Harry playfully on the arm.

"We should probably take this cloak off before we go in though," Draco said, indicating the invisibility cloak. "Don't want to alarm the locals when we suddenly appear." Harry laughed and nodded and they moved over to a small alleyway next to the pub. Harry pulled the cloak off the both of them and stowed it in his bag. Then they walked over to the pub and went in.

It was warm inside, with a cozy fire blazing in the fireplace on the far side of the room. Evidently when they were not expecting students, The Three Broomsticks stowed many of its tables and chairs in favor of large leather arm chairs and coffee tables. It made the pub feel more like the house common room, and Harry liked it immensely. He wanted to tell Ron and Hermione about it, but that would involve telling them about Draco, and Harry had conveniently not told either of them about his date. He was sure Hermione knew, as note passing in class was always something that she noticed and often chided Harry about, but he was not ready to talk to Ron about it.

"What do you want to drink?" Draco asked, snapping Harry out of his reverie. Harry frowned.

"I thought I would order," he said.

"Yes," Draco said, sarcasm dripping from the word. "Because no one will ask 'Why is the famous Harry Potter getting a drink at a bar and not at school? As I would prefer not to get sent back to Hogwarts in disgrace, I will order." Harry put up a hand automatically and tried to flatten his hair over his scar.

"Fair point," Harry said. He pulled his collar up and tried to hide in it. Draco rolled his eyes. "What are you having?"

"Gobligin and tonic." Harry stared. "What? If we're going to get drunk, we may as well do it properly. Now what do you want?" Harry cast his mind around frantically for a drink.

"A scofflaw," he said.

"A what?"

"A scofflaw. Just order it, they'll know." Draco shrugged, then turned away from Harry and walked up to the bar. While Draco waited for their drinks, Harry found them a couple of chairs in a dark corner of the bar. By the time Draco had returned, Harry was convinced that everyone was staring at him and jumped when Draco put the drinks down on the table.

"Thanks," Harry said, picking up his glass and taking a sip. "Mm, delicious."

"What's in that?" Draco asked. He began to drink his gobligin and tonic.

"Uh, rye whiskey, sweet vermouth, lime juice, grenadine and a dash of bitters," Harry replied. "Want to try it?" Draco squinted at Harry's glass.

"That sounds like a Muggle drink," he said.

"It is."

"Then why bother?"

"Because it's good?"

"Is it?"

"Yes! Try a sip." Draco reached out and cautiously tasted the Scofflaw, looking for all the world like he expected it to explode in his mouth, or bite him. He frowned in deep concentration.

"Not bad," he said eventually. "But wizard drinks are better."

"Really? I've never actually tried one," Harry admitted. Draco looked at him like he had grown a second head.

"We'll have to fix that then," Draco said. He shoved his drink across the small side table to Harry. "Here. Drink." Harry took a sip and made a face.

"I don't like gin," he responded to Draco's confused face. "I'm sure other wizard drinks are great though. How about this: I'll let you decide what my next drink is. You can make me try whatever you want. Just not gin. Deal? And then I can see if you're right about them being better." If the smile that crossed Draco's face worried Harry, he didn't let it show.

"Deal."

And so the night ensued with Draco and Harry trying most of the different wizarding liquors, including a thimbleful of the 'Hagrid Special', on which they both gagged and promptly burst out laughing. They left the Three Broomsticks in high spirits around eleven - it was a school night after all. Harry decided it was best to cast a silencing spell around them as they snuck back through Honeydukes as Draco kept giggling for no apparent reason.

Harry was happy to find out that Draco was a funny drunk. He had been partially worried that Draco would turn maudlin when confronted with lots of alcohol, but he had turned out to be a hilarious drinking companion. He had Harry laughing for a full minute at his Professor Snape impression.

Once they were safely through the trap door, Harry took the silencing charm and the invisibility cloat off as there was no longer a need for them.

"Lumos," he muttered and his wand lit up at the end.

"Ooh, shiny light," Draco snickered. Harry rolled his eyes. "No, I'm just kidding. I'm not _that_ drunk. Honestly, Potter, Malfoys can hold their drink."

"Bet Seamus could out drink you," Harry retorted.

"Bet he couldn't."

"Careful what you say, Malfoy. A bet is what led us to this date."

"You said it was a dare," Malfoy pointed out.

"Dare, bet - same difference."

"S'not though," Draco said.

"It's not what?"

"The reason we're here. We're here because I said yes to you asking again the next day. That's different. You asked me without the bet or dare or what have you."

"I know," Harry said. "Which is good. Because otherwise I would feel a bit wrong about doing this." Harry leaned in and kissed Draco on the lips. It was a clumsy kiss. Teeth bumped, noses got in the way and Draco started to giggle, but it was a kiss nonetheless. And it made Harry's stomach feel as though it were full of butterflies.

"You're crap at that," Draco said, pulling away and laughing.

"No, I'm not!" Harry protested.

"It should be done more like this." And Draco shoved Harry against the nearest wall, twisted his fists into Harry's shirt collar, pulled his face up and kissed him properly.

It was not the kiss Harry would have expected to come from Draco Malfoy, whom he thought would be much more reserved. Not only did it give the impression that Draco somewhat liked him, but it was much more passionate than anything Harry had seen from the cool, sneering Slytherin. He almost though that Draco couldn't feel this much emotion, but of course that was silly. He was guarded with his emotions, yes, but he was still a human. A human with a particularly talented tongue as it turned out.

Harry moaned as Draco nibbled his lower lip. He reached out and wrapped his arms around Draco's waist, pulling him closer, but Draco pulled back.

"Damn you and your alcohol, Potter," the blond muttered. "I shouldn't be doing this."

"Yes, you should," Harry retorted. "You most definitely should." He tried to kiss Draco again.

"What would my father say?" Draco asked, taking a step backwards and letting go of Harry.

"He's not here."

"That's true, but what if he found out?"

"How would he?" Harry was beginning to get slightly annoyed. Lucius Malfoy had messed up enough good things in Harry's life. He wasn't about to screw up this evening. "We're in a fucking tunnel. Literally no one can see us right now." He gestured to the dirt walls and pitch blackness of the tunnel.

"This is also true. But do we have to be in this dirty underground tunnel? My hair, you know. I have to keep up appearances." Harry almost fell for Draco's sarcasm, but he saw the side of Malfoy's mouth quirk into the smallest of smiles.

"Yes," he said in mock seriousness. "If I'm going to despoil you, it's going to have to be dirty. Otherwise you won't be properly besmirched and your family name will recover." Draco snorted in laughter, which set Harry to laughing again.

"Really though," Draco said after they had both calmed down. "Could we perhaps continue this in a place with light? Or warmth? Or, I don't know, a bed?"

"Yes," Harry relented. "That sounds like a good plan." They collected their broomsticks from their leaning spots and flew back to the bottom of the chute. They took their time flying, very conscious that their reaction times were not as fast as they had been earlier in the evening. By the time they reached the statue, Draco was yawning.

They scrambled up the chute and out into the dark and deserted corridor. Harry swung the cloak around them again.

"Mm," Draco said, leaning against Harry as they began to walk towards the grand staircase. "Potter."

"Yes, Malfoy?" Harry asked.

"Can we actually just sleep? I'm asleep on my feet and we have double potions first thing in the morning. With _Severus_." Draco imitated Snape's oily drawl and Harry gave a bark of laughter which then turned into a yawn.

"Yes," he said. "Sleep sounds good."

"Goodnight, Potter," Draco said. He turned to face Harry and gave him one last lingering kiss before stealing out from beneath the cloak and hurrying away down the corridor. Harry put a hand up to his lips and watched him disappear.

"Goodnight, Draco," he said to the empty hallway.

* * *

Just as an FYI, I will be on vacation for the next two weeks, so there will not be any updates until I am back.

...Riyan...


	4. Chapter 4

This story was originally published from 2007-2010 before I removed it around 2012. Recently, I decided to rework it and republish it.

DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

* * *

"You came home late last night," Ron said, pulling on one of his socks. Harry felt color rise up his cheeks and busied himself with fixing his tie in the mirror.

"Did I?" he asked, trying to sound nonchalant. His tie fixed, he reached up and tried in vain to flatten his unruly hair.

"Yeah, you must have gotten in around midnight." Ron came and stood next to him and attempted to fix his own tie. "Where were you?"

"Time for breakfast!" Harry cried and ran down the stairs. Ron shook his head but let the subject drop and followed his brown haired friend down to the Great Hall.

The Slytherins were already at breakfast when Harry sat down at the Gryffindor table. He glanced over at Malfoy and saw the blond chatting with Blaise Zabini while he munched on some toast. As though he could feel Harry's gaze on him, Draco looked up and briefly met Harry's eye. Harry felt himself redden again and he looked away. He turned his attention instead to the breakfast foods before him.

"Blast," Seamus harrumphed as he sat down next to Harry, slamming his bag emphatically down on the bench beside him. "I would give anything not to have Double Potions right now."

"Cheer up, Seamus," Ron said. "Who knows, maybe Snape will let us choose our own partners today."

"Sure, he will. When pigs fly," the Irishman muttered, filling his plate with sausages and baked beans.

"Actually," Hermione interjected. "I did recently see an article about a new species of wild boar they've discovered in the Amazonian rainforest that appears to have the ability to hover off of the ground for minutes at a time. The Muggle scientists are very confused and are trying to pin the phenomenon on excess helium production from the boars' digestive systems." Ron rolled his eyes and mouthed 'know-it-all' at Harry.

"Well then," Seamus said around a bite of sausage. "A man can hope."

…

"And a man can be disappointed," he muttered half an hour later after Snape had announced that they would be working in assigned pairs.

"Cheer up, Seamus," Ron said, patting him on the arm. "Disappointment was inevitable. It is Snape after all."

"Zabini and Granger," Snape called. "Weasley and Parkinson. Longbottom and Bullstrode. Finnegan and Greengrass. Potter and Malfoy."

Harry had been expecting it, but his stomach still twinged with butterflies as he gathered up his things and went to stand by Malfoy.

"Potter," Malfoy said curtly as Harry put his bag and cauldron down.

"Hello, Malfoy." Harry acknowledged the blond with a small nod of his head. They were clearly pretending they hadn't played tonsil hockey the night before.

"Sit down," Snape intoned. "Get out your quills and some parchment. This morning's lesson will mostly involve taking notes, but we will get to some practical work later. Today you will be starting your mid-term coursework. You will be brewing the rather complicated Ehwaz potion. This potion is about teamwork, so you will have to be civil and work together if you want your potion to succeed.

"If, at the end of the six-week brewing period, you have successfully brewed your potion, then you will be allowed to try a sip. The Ehwaz potion, when brewed correctly, facilitates astral travel, which will allow you a brief glimpse of your partner's future. The clarity of your vision is wholly dependent on how well you concoct your potion. Thus, I expect Longbottom's vision to be akin to staring through a thick wall of mud." Harry glanced over at Neville who had buried his head in his arms.

"One of the reasons this potion is so potent and difficult is that it involves the use of runes." Out of the corner of his eye, Harry saw Hermione perk up at the mention of runes. "For that reason, I have invited Professor Babbling to come and speak on the topic for those of you who were not intelligent enough to take up Ancient Runes when you had the chance." Draco gave a snort of laughter beside Harry and Harry turned his head to look at him.

"Time for me to have a nap then," the blond whispered. Harry rolled his eyes and picked up his quill, determined to show Malfoy that he was perfectly intelligent enough to understand Runes.

Runes, as it turned out, were difficult.

"So, if your quill slips a bit and it looks more like this," he pointed at one rune he had drawn, "than this," he pointed at another. "Then the whole meaning is entirely different?" Draco nodded. "But I can barely tell them apart!" Harry threw his hands up in despair and Draco clapped a hand to his forehead in exasperation.

"You're hopeless, Potter," he said wearily. "How you've made it this far at Hogwarts is beyond me." Harry scowled at him. "Granger must have been doing all your work for you."

"She hasn't," Harry retorted, anger flaring in his chest. "Just because I'm not good at bloody runes, it doesn't mean I'm stupid. It just means I'm not good at runes."

"Okay," Draco said, putting his hands up in surrender. "Don't get your knickers in a twist. I need you to be nice and calm while we start chopping these onions. Notice how it says to shred them tenderly."

"Thanks, Malfoy. I can _read_ , you know." Harry picked up his knife and then put it down again. He took a deep breath and tried to quell his emotions. "Do you have to be such a twat?" he asked. Draco looked up sharply from his onion. Harry could see some color in the blond's cheeks and sure enough, Draco put down his knife as well.

"I beg your pardon, Potter?"

"Why must you always insult me, or belittle me, or make me feel stupid?"

"Do I?" Draco looked like he was torn between elation and concern. "My, I didn't realize I had such an effect on you."

"Don't flatter yourself," Harry snapped. "It's annoying and right now it's really not helping."

"Right, I'm sorry. You're decently intelligent. Can we carry on now?" Draco picked up his knife and turned his attention back to his onion. Harry bit his lip and took a deep breath, letting his anger drain away. Had Malfoy really just apologized to him? It was probably just for their potion and it had been little more than a passing comment, but even still, it gave Harry a small warm feeling in the middle of his chest.

"Now, as you finish chopping your first ingredients," Snape said, looking around the room to see how the class was getting along. "I will take you, group by group, to your individual brewing rooms. As this potion requires teamwork, you will be working in isolated pods so that your partnership will not be influenced by anyone else around you." He gave a pointed stare at Ron, who had been on the receiving end of some encouraging whispering from Hermione.

"These pods are sound proof and will be locked to your DNA so that no one aside from you or your partner can enter the room. This not only prevents others from tampering with your potion during the brewing period, it also encourages teamwork with only your partner. This way you cannot use pre-existing friendships to improve the quality of your potion." There was a susurrus as everyone turned to their friends and muttered about the unfairness of this project.

"How am I supposed to get a passing grade with him as my partner?" Pansy Parkinson whispered to Blaise Zabini, while Ron asked nearly the exact same question to Hermione.

"Soundproof, huh?" Draco said so quietly that only Harry could hear him. He looked over at the blond and Draco winked at him, giving Harry the first hint that he hadn't just imagined their date the night before, before turning his eyes back to his onion. Harry's mouth went dry as his stomach turned over in a not unpleasant manner.

 _Concentrate_ , he thought, squinting down at his onion. It was starting to make his eyes water. He pushed his glasses up and wiped his eyes with his sleeve, but that just seemed to make the burning sensation worse.

"How are you not crying?" Harry asked, looking over at Draco, who had now finished slicing his onion and was putting pieces of it onto his set of scales. Draco smirked.

"Contact lenses," he said. "Hurry up, Potter. We need to make sure you've chopped the same amount." Harry scowled and turned back to his onion which was now blurry as he looked at it through tear-filled eyes. He heard Draco sigh and then felt himself being pushed gently out of the way as the blond took over his chopping.

"Thanks," Harry muttered. He put down his knife and covered his eyes with his sleeves. _Merlin, why did it hurt so much?_

"Don't mention it," Draco said, deftly slicing the onion. "In the meantime, you can get started on the rose petals. They're about as delicate as you are."

"Oh, ha bleedin' ha," Harry said. He wiped his eyes one more time and then walked around the desk to collect the rose petals. He looked down at the instructions and minced them before putting them in a separate prep bowl to the onions. As he scraped the last of the petals off of his chopping board, Snape walked up to their table.

"Follow me. Bring your things." He waited for them to gather up their prepped ingredients and cauldron, then turned with a swish of his long, black robes. Harry and Draco followed him out into the corridor and over to a painting of a knight that was hung next to a long line of portraits. Harry groaned as he recognized Sir Cadogan.

"Welcome, good sirs," the tiny knight said. "What is the password?"

"Scurvy cur," Snape said in a bored tone.

"Yes, you are a scurvy cur indeed!" cried Sir Cadogan and he swung forward to let them in. Across the doorway behind the Sir Cadogan was a shimmering wall of what Harry recognized as wards.

"I will need you to place your hands into the wards," Snape said. "They need to learn your DNA." Harry and Draco obliged and stuck their arms into the glimmering web. Harry watched as sparks crawled over his hand, shocking and stinging as they went. He winced and saw Draco do the same beside him. After about twenty seconds the pain subsided and they pulled their arms back.

"Very well, you're all set," Snape said. "Good luck." And he swept away, his cloak swishing behind him.

* * *

Thank you to everyone who reviewed. All encouragement is much appreciated!

...Riyan...


	5. Chapter 5

This story was originally published from 2007-2010 before I removed it around 2012. Recently, I decided to rework it and republish it.

DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books, and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

* * *

"Now what?" Harry asked, staring at the wards.

"Now we get to work," Draco said. He pushed past Harry and into the room. Harry shrugged and followed him.

The room was larger than he had expected, with two tables - one to hold their cauldron and one to prepare ingredients - in the center. On the left wall, there was a large sink. There were chairs at the tables and, for some inexplicable reason, a small two person couch against the back wall. Draco had placed his cauldron on one of the tables, so Harry put his ingredient bowl down on the other. They spent the next few minutes ferrying their items from the classroom to their special room while Sir Cadogan happily called them, and anyone else who walked by, scurvy curs.

"We're going to have to change that password," Harry said. He put down the last of his potions equipment down on the table.

"Why? Because everyone knows what it is? Potter, no one can get in aside from us."

"No, it's starting to drive me mad. If he calls me that one more time…" He took a step menacingly towards the inside of the portrait, raising a fist. Draco put out a hand to stop him.

"Yes," he said. "We get it. The knight is an annoying prick. Now can we get on with our work? I don't want to have to stay here through lunch." Harry nodded and let his arm drop to his side. He turned back to their prep table and began shredding some dried bat wings, which were the next ingredient to be added.

While he worked, he watched Draco go about setting up their cauldron. The blond seemed to shut out everything around him as he measured out six liters of water. Harry watched as Draco unconsciously bit his lip while fiddled with the magical flame under the cauldron, watched as he tucked a stray piece of hair behind his ear before re-measuring the onions, and watched as his brow furrowed in concentration while he weighed the rose petals.

"Those bat wings look good, Potter," Draco said. Harry gave a start and put his knife down. He had finished shredding the wings without really noticing. "It seems you _can_ follow instructions."

Harry rolled his eyes but did not rise to the bait. Instead, he put the wings into a bowl and began to prepare the rosemary, pulling off the little leaves one by one.

"Give me that," Draco said, reaching over and pulling the rosemary out of Harry's hands. He deftly stripped the stems and dropped the leaves onto the table. He quickly minced them.

"Show off," Harry muttered.

"Just well practiced," Draco retorted. "Ready to add things to the cauldron? We have to do it together-"

"-Whilst holding hands and thinking good thoughts, I know."

"Precisely. And then afterward we can sit around and braid each other's hair and make daisy chains!" Draco cupped his face with his hands and fluttered his eyelashes sarcastically at the ceiling. Harry snorted with laughter. Draco on his own, away from other people, was actually rather fun to be around. He wondered if this was how Draco acted around his Slytherin friends and not for the first time he tried to imagine how things might have gone if he had accepted the blond's friendship back at the start of their First Year.

"Right," Harry said. "Give me your hand." He swallowed nervously and held out his arm. Draco grasped his hand firmly and they both picked up bowls of onion with their free hands.

"Think happy thoughts, Potter," Draco said. Harry thought back to the previous evening and imagined Draco nibbling his lip again. "Three, two, one." They tipped the onions into the now bubbling cauldron. Gold sparks shot up from the surface of the potion and Draco blinked in surprise. "Merlin, Harry. What were you thinking about?"

"Quidditch," Harry lied.

"Well, keep thinking about that then." They repeated the procedure with the rest of the ingredients in order and then took turns stirring it three times clockwise and three times counterclockwise. Emerald sparks danced along the top of their potion. Draco looked at it in satisfaction.

"Well that went surprisingly well," he said as he took the spoon out of the cauldron and walked it over to the sink.

"What were you thinking about?" Harry asked, carrying over the empty ingredient bowls.

"Also Quidditch." Also a lie.

Draco took the bowls from Harry and began running them under the water. Harry found a dishtowel near the sink and dried things as Draco finished washing them. He was very aware of the fact that they were standing next to each other. They were so close that he could feel the warmth coming from the other young man. Every time Draco handed Harry a bowl to dry their fingers touched briefly, sending small shivers up Harry's spine.

"So, what is the next step for this potion?" Harry asked. He tried to sound nonchalant and like the blond hadn't made him feel giddy just by being so close to him. Draco handed him the last of the bowls, then went to read the instructions. Harry dried the bowl quickly and stacked it, along with the others, on the prep table.

"We have to come back in eight hours and add the next ingredient." He reached into his robes and pulled out a pocket watch and consulted it. Harry watched him curiously. He didn't know anyone else who had a pocket watch. "That will be at seven twenty this evening."

"I guess we finished early then," Harry said, working backwards to determine what the time was. "I was expecting to have to miss lunch." He raised his arms above his head and stretched. The missing sleep from his late night was catching up to him.

"I guess you're only mostly useless, as opposed to entirely useless."

"Oh, Malfoy, you wound me." He clapped a hand over his heart and pouted.

"Whatever, Potter," Draco said. He began gathering his books into his bag. "I'm going to the library. If we have this extra time before lunch, I might as well use it productively." He started towards the door.

"Are we ever going to talk about last night?" Harry blurted out before he could leave. Draco stopped in his tracks.

"What is there to talk about?" he asked without turning around. Harry ground his teeth in frustration. He felt like they had danced around the subject all lesson.

"Oh, I don't know," he said sarcastically. "How about that fact that we-"

"-That you showed me a secret passageway out of the school? What? Scared I'm going to share your secrets, Potter?" Anger burned hot in Harry's chest and he felt almost dizzy with it. Draco was, of course, the only person who could drive him from happy to angry in a matter of seconds and this ability was currently compounded by the fact that Harry felt vulnerable given his now undeniable attraction to the blond.

"Or we won't talk about it," he snapped. He threw his arms up in surrender. "But at some point, you have to realize that it was a thing that happened and it's really not a big deal." Draco slowly turned to face Harry.

"It is a big deal," he said quietly. He was staring at a spot on the floor that was a foot to the left of Harry's feet and a hint of color had risen in his cheeks.

"Why?"

"Because I didn't hate it."

"Well, don't damn me with faint praise or anything." Malfoy's eyes snapped up to meet Harry's and the blond sneered.

"Oh, get over yourself, Potter," he spat. Then he turned and stalked out of the room, leaving Harry feeling confused and angry. He wasn't sure how the conversation had turned back to insulting him after Draco had almost admitted to enjoying their date. He sighed and threw himself on the small couch, still unsure why it was there, but grateful for its presence.

…

Once Draco had left their privacy pod, he did not start in the direction of the library, turning instead towards the Slytherin dorms.

"Acromantula," he barked at the stretch of wall that hid the entrance to the dorm and it moved aside quickly, as if it could sense his irritation. The common room was blessedly empty and he swept through it and down the corridor to the boys' dormitory. He threw himself down on his bed and pulled the curtains shut.

After a moment, he sat up. His mind was racing. He would not be surprised if he had completely blown it with Harry now. He dug the heels of his hands into his eyes. Why did he have to be such an idiot? Why couldn't he have just admitted that he'd had a good time last night? That he'd liked kissing Harry? He frowned. He was having trouble even admitting that to himself, which he knew was ridiculous. But then, it had taken him bloody long enough to admit himself that he even liked Potter in the first place.

He supposed he could go and apologize to Harry, but on second reflection, he was far too proud for that. He fell back on his pillows in exasperation. It was all the more frustrating because they had been getting along quite well, particularly if their potion was any indication.

"Oh fuck," Draco said into his pillow.

Their potion. They couldn't be angry with each other when they were brewing their potion or it would be ruined. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Pride be damned. He would not get a failing grade in this assignment. He would have to apologize. He sat up with a groan and heaved himself off of the bed. He cursed again and kicked a chair as he left the room. This did nothing aside from cause a searing pain in his big toe. Glowering, he stalked out of the dorm.

…

Harry decided that the couch was very comfy and thus throwing himself onto said couch was not just him throwing a temper tantrum. He had meant to come and lay there because he had been tired from standing at their cauldron. Yes, that was it. He wasn't being childish or anything. And he was definitely not sulking.

The couch was so comfy, in fact, that Harry was considering having a nap before lunch. So comfy that the nap was not so much a decision as a thing that just happened. His eyes drooped shut of their own accord and before Harry could even think to set an alarm, he was asleep.


	6. Chapter 6

This story was originally published from 2007-2010 before I removed it around 2012. Recently, I decided to rework it and republish it.

DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books, and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

* * *

Harry was rudely awoken by an impatient Malfoy poking him in the ribs. He groaned and blinked owlishly up at the blond.

"What?" he asked. His brain was still half asleep and the logic of the real world hadn't kicked in yet.

"Well, for one thing," Malfoy snapped, crossing his arms in front of him. "It's lunchtime." Harry sat up, shaking his head to clear the last of the sleep from his brain.

"Are Ron and Hermione looking for me?"

"No. Maybe. I don't know. I haven't seen Granger or the Weasel. I imagine they're still working on their potions."

"Then why the hell are you here?" Newly awoken Harry was quite blunt, Draco realized. No tact at all. He wondered what things he could get him to confess to in this state. He filed that information away for later. He needed to apologize to Harry before he lost his nerve.

"I came to say that I was sorry," he said quickly. Then he studied his nails, pretending to find them very interesting so that he wouldn't have to see the shocked look that was sure to be passing over Harry's face.

"That's very big of you, Malfoy." Harry swung his legs off the couch and stood up. "I'm sorry too. I shouldn't have gotten so angry."

"No," Draco said, now staring at the floor about two feet to the left of Harry's foot. "You had every right to be upset. I shouldn't have avoided the subject. The truth is I'm not very good at talking about my emotions or my personal life. And it's all the more complicated because it's you." Harry walked up to him and took one of his hands. Then he reached up with his free hand and lifted Draco's chin up until the blond was looking at him.

"It's okay," Harry whispered. "I get it. You don't want anyone to know about us."

"Well, no," Draco said. "But that's not what I meant."

"I'm not going to say anything to anyone. I'm a very private person too, you know, despite what the Daily Prophet might have you think. As a rule, I don't talk about how I feel, unless it's something physical like my scar hurting, so I'm not very good at it either." Draco gave him a small, disheartened smile.

"Damn it, Potter, I'm trying to talk about how I think I might like you."

"And I would like to say for the record that I didn't hate last night either and I might just like you too." They stared at each other for what felt like an eternity but in reality was only a few seconds. Then Harry glanced down at his watch and said,

"Oh! Time for lunch." He made to pull away but Draco gripped his hand firmly.

"Oh, no you don't, Potter," he said. "You don't get to just walk away after all of that without kissing me again."Harry smirked at him.

"Good," he said. "I'm glad you said that as I feel the same way." He reached up and cupped Draco's cheek in his hand before leaning in and pressing their lips together.

Apologizing, Draco decided as Harry's tongue ran over his bottom lip, wasn't so bad after all.

…

They were fifteen minutes late to lunch, but they were still two of the first Gryffindor and Slytherin sixth years to sit down at their respective tables. Harry spotted Hermione at the Gryffindor table and sat down across from her. She was engrossed in the potions book that she was annotating, so he waved at her briefly and then began to fill his plate with food.

It was a full ten minutes before Ron dropped his bag down next to Harry and joined them.

"Mental," he said. "That woman is absolutely bloody mental. Snape clearly paired us so that I would fail this assignment." He piled sandwiches on his plate and began shoving them into his mouth. Hermione sighed and put down her quill.

"Was it really that bad?" she asked.

"Yes," Ron said vehemently. "I was trying really hard to do things right and she kept blaming me for the fact that it wasn't going as well as it could be. It was infuriating, which of course made it go even worse." Hermione reached over and patted him gently on the forearm.

"I'm sorry," she said. "It's not the end of the world, though. One of the good things about this potion is that there's time to fix things that go wrong." Ron groaned.

"Stop reminding me that this damn thing is going to take six weeks. Six weeks! I don't know if I'm going to make it." He buried his head in his arms.

"How did you potion go, Harry?" Hermione asked. She looked at him with concern. "I can't believe Snape paired you with Malfoy again. I can't imagine that went well." Harry shrugged.

"It was fine." Ron looked up from his arms. Harry shrugged again. "Malfoy is good at potions, so he was all business. At least until we had finished adding ingredients for the time being. Then, of course, he was a git." Ron nodded sagely.

"Git," he agreed.

Harry was pleased with how the conversation had played out because technically it was true. They had been civil until they had finished working for the lesson and then they had argued. His only lie was one of omission, when he failed to mention their make up (and make out) session.

"How 'bout you, Hermione?" Harry asked. "You got to lunch before I did." Harry wondered if he would have been the first to lunch if he hadn't fallen asleep.

"It could have been worse," Hermione said. "Zabini and I at least seem to share the same desire for good grades."

"Yeah," Ron said. "Plus he's not an ass like Malfoy."

"Well, he did seem a bit annoyed to be stuck working with a Muggle-born," Hermione continued, rolling her eyes. "He was quite reluctant to hold hands while we were adding the ingredients, but he did manage to in the end."

"I really don't understand these pureblood morons," Ron said. "Don't they understand what inbreeding is?" Harry snorted with laughter and Hermione gave Ron a small, grateful smile.

"Yes, well," Hermione said. "If you don't like Muggles, you probably aren't going to appreciate their science, are you?"

"But see Hermione," Ron protested. "I learned!" He seemed very proud of himself.

"Yes, Ron," Hermione agreed, trying to keep the condescension out of her voice. "You did eventually." Ron grinned and Harry did his best not to laugh.

…

At seven that evening, Harry stood up.

"Well," he announced to Ron, Hermione, and Seamus. "I'm off to work on our potion." Hermione looked at the clock and frowned.

"You're leaving rather early," she said. "I don't need to be there until seven forty and you didn't arrive at lunch until well after I got there."

"We finished decently early," Harry said. "But then we spent a good while insulting each other. Plus, I want to be early so that I can get started on the ingredients so that we can spend as little time working on it as possible."

There was a moment in which Ron, Hermione, and Seamus all looked at each other before they began to gather their things as one, in unspoken agreement that Harry was right. Harry grinned and stuffed his herbology homework in his bag along with the rest of his books.

…

Draco looked around the common room in irritation. _Someone_ had pointed out the giant squid in the window and now the First Years were crowded around and squealing at it. One of them was tapping on the glass trying to get the squid's attention.

"Ooh no, Thomas," one of the girls cried. "What if you break the glass?"

"Scared of getting wet, Millie?" the boy called Thomas sneered. A chorus of laughs and jeers followed. Draco ground his teeth and glared over at them. Didn't they have any homework they were supposed to be doing?

"Stupid Firsties," Pansy said, looking up. "They'll learn."

"You're damn right they will," Draco muttered. He pulled out his wand, pointed it at the First Years and said, "Silencio." He, Blaise and Pansy watched as the First Years continued to mouth at each other, becoming more and more panicked as no sound came out. Thomas's eyes bulged and he clutched his throat. Blaise shook his head.

"Finite incantatum," he said and the common room exploded in the sounds of First Years screaming.

"Idiots," Draco said. He glanced at the clock and saw that it was time to go. "Well, time to get back to potions." He put extra effort in sounding as unexcited by the prospect as he could. "See you later." He picked up his books and stalked out of the common room. Pansy looked at Blaise who shrugged and continued working on his Charms essay.

Draco did his best not to seem too happy to see Harry when he walked into their private room. His shock at the fact that the brunet was already slicing the mushrooms that were their next ingredient was genuine however and he did little to hide it.

"It seems someone has trained you well, Potter," he said. Harry looked up and frowned at him but continued slicing.

"I just figured this way we could be finished more quickly," Harry said coolly.

"Fair point," Draco agreed. He began to roll up his sleeves. "I'll tackle the polar bear liver then, shall I?" Harry wrinkled his nose and nodded.

"Please." Draco rummaged around in his bag for his dragon skin gloves and pulled them out triumphantly. Harry looked up from the mushrooms and gave him a quizzical look. "What're the gloves for?"

"I'm not touching polar bear liver," Draco said. "I don't want my skin to fall off." Harry rolled his eyes.

"I think that only happens if you eat it, Draco."

"I'm not taking any chances," the blond replied. He left Harry to the mushrooms and walked across the hall to the chilled storeroom. Picking up his and Harry's allotment of liver, he noticed that they were the first to get to this point and he smiled to himself as he turned to leave the room. He dropped the smile when he saw Hermione standing in the doorway.

"Granger," he said, nodding at her as she walked into the room.

"Malfoy."

"I say that I was surprised that you were here so early, but then both you and Blaise are such goody two shoes that you probably cooperated quite well for your potion."

"I'm surprised to see you here before me," she retorted. "It's almost as if you and Harry were getting along while making yours."

"Don't mistake my desire for good grades for any kind of desire for that speccy git," Draco replied and pushed past her out the door. Hermione raised her eyebrows but said nothing. A second later Draco hurried back. "I meant 'desire to spend any time with that speccy git'. It's late and I'm in a hurry to get these back to prepare them." And he left the storeroom again cursing under his breath.


	7. Chapter 7

This story was originally published from 2007-2010 before I removed it around 2012. Recently, I decided to rework it and republish it.

DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books, and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

...

Thank you to all of you who reviewed! I really appreciate getting feedback! - Riyan

* * *

"We're going to have to have a fight in front of your friends," Draco said as he re-entered their room.

"What? Why?" Harry had now finished chopping the mushrooms and was measuring them out.

"Because I can't do words. My language skills are woefully inadequate and have failed me."

"What did you say?"

"Erm, it was something along the lines of 'don't think my desire for good grades equates to a desire for Potter'. No, that's not quite right." In reality, the words were burned into Draco's mind and made his insides squirm in embarrassment every time he thought about them. Frowning, he looked over at Harry. The brunet looked like he was trying not to laugh.

"What?" Draco snapped.

"Nothing," Harry said quickly. "Just the thought of you being inarticulate is amusing." Draco sighed heavily and set to work butchering the polar bear liver.

"So what should our fight be about?" Harry asked a few minutes later.

"Oh you know, something mundane like it usually is. I don't know. Tease me because my father is in Azkaban or something."

"That seems harsh."

"Well that's the point, you idiot. Plus it's true." The fact that this would actually upset Draco was an added bonus in his mind. He could get genuinely upset with Harry if Harry said something about his father, making their fight look more real.

"But I wouldn't normally say something like that. I'm not that mean."

"Oh really? I seem to recall you insulting my mother's face in fourth year." Harry frowned. He did not remember this and he felt a pang of compunction in the pit of his stomach. He swallowed hard.

"Well," he said slowly. "I'm sure you deserved it at the time." And then he felt bad for attempting to deflect the blame.

"Yeah, well, then I got turned into a ferret for trying to attack you, so it was a pretty bad day in my books."Harry snorted with laughter at the memory but wisely turned it into a cough. Malfoy glared at him all the same, which Harry reasoned was fair. No wonder he hadn't remembered it. The image of a white, squealing ferret flailing around the entrance hall had stayed in his memory, but the altercation before it had not.

They were silent for a few minutes as both of them contemplated fourth year and continued with their potion preparation. Then Harry spoke.

"I'm sorry," he said. Draco looked up in surprise.

"For what?" he asked. "You haven't done anything." He narrowed his eyes and stared a Harry for a second. "Have you?"

"No," Harry assured him quickly. "But I'm sorry for insulting your mother. No wonder you were angry enough to attack me."

"Potter, that was years ago. I'm over it." Harry wasn't sure he was over the ferret part of that day, but he didn't want to press it and so stayed quiet. "Are you done with those mushrooms? It's about time to add the next ingredients." Harry nodded and carried the two sets of mushrooms over to Draco.

"All set," he said. "Time to hold hands and think happy thoughts?"

"Yes," Draco said, peeling off his gloves. They carried the four bowls of ingredients over to their cauldron and then grasped hands. Harry decided that he liked holding Draco's hand. The Beatles had a point. Holding hands was nice.

…

"Zabini, have you noticed anything strange about Draco recently?" Hermione asked as she walked back into the potion room she shared with Blaise.

"Strange how?" Blaise asked, looking up from the instructions. Hermione frowned.

"Has he mentioned Harry at all?"

"No, why would he? I mean, aside from the fact that they're stuck together for this project. But still, no, not really. Why do you ask?"

Hermione related her encounter with the blond in the storeroom. Blaise shrugged.

"The cold room always makes him nervous. He's always afraid he'll get locked in. He probably just misspoke." Hermione looked at Zabini thoughtfully for a moment.

"You're probably right," she said finally. "It just seemed so out of character for him." Her dark haired companion shrugged again.

"He also hates dealing with polar bear liver. He read somewhere that it can make your skin fall off and now he's terrified that it's going to happen to him." Hermione laughed.

"Have you pointed out to him that it will only happen if you _eat_ it?" she asked.

"You mean that can actually happen?" Zabini looked shocked and eyed the polar bear liver she had just placed on the table nervously. Hermione stifled another laugh.

"Yes," she said. "They're very rich in vitamin A, so if you eat enough of it, your skin begins to peel off and you die a very painful death. So, if you ever get stuck in the arctic, _don't_ eat polar bear or seal liver. The rest of the bear is fine. It's just the liver you have to look out for."

"Wow," Blaise said. He was genuinely impressed. "Who knew Muggles knew so much?"

"I think you'd be surprised if you ever took the time to get to know one," Hermione said coolly. She picked up her knife and began to work on the polar bear liver. "In some ways, they're more advanced than wizards. Probably because they've never had magic to help them with things."

"I never thought of it that way."

"I mean, they can talk to people in other places without having to stick their heads in fireplaces." Talking via the Floo network had always unnerved Hermione. A telephone was so much more sophisticated in her mind.

On the one hand, Blaise's ignorance and subsequent prejudice irritated Hermione. On the other hand, he at least seemed somewhat receptive to learning about where he might be wrong. Not for the first time, Hermione realized that some wizards were probably anti-Muggle because they didn't know anything about them and therefore they were afraid of them. Or at the very least mistrustful. Sometimes she even found Arthur Weasley's fascination with Muggles a little condescending. It was like he enjoyed watching them from afar but couldn't fathom actually learning anything about their ways of life or the technology that he professed to have such an interest in.

"What's wrong with the Floo network?" Blaise asked, snapping Hermione out of her reverie. He sounded a bit defensive and she was worried that she had potentially pushed it too far, but she had already started down this line of conversation, so she was damned if she wouldn't finish it.

"Are you saying it's not a little strange to get down on your knees and stick your head in a fire and your bum up in the air just to talk to someone?"

"I suppose it is a little undignified when you put it that way."

"I'll grant you the Floo network has its pros, such as covering vast distances in a short period of time, but it's almost strange that wizards can't have a conversation with someone without having to be physically close, even if it's just your head that's nearby." They lapsed into silence as they both concentrated on their ingredients.

"Tell me more about Muggles," Blaise said after a time. He wasn't sure what had caused him to say this, but once the words were out, he realized he was actually curious. Hermione looked up at him and smiled.

"What do you want to know?" she asked. Perhaps there was hope for Zabini yet.

…

"I would say that I was surprised that you were early, Weasley," Pansy said by way of greeting. "But you're friends with that swot, Granger and I'm sure she was just panting to get down here and get a head start on her potion. And then you just followed her like the good little lap dog that you are." Ron scowled at her.

"You're hardly late, Parkinson," he said. "What's your excuse?"

"Well, I, for one, want to get decent marks."

"Yeah, 'cause I'm just itching to fail," Ron said.

"That doesn't surprise me."

"It's called sarcasm."

"Moving along," Pansy said. She rolled up her sleeves and pulled out her potions book. "What do you need me to do?" Ron gestured towards the mushrooms.

"Those need shredding," he said.

"Right," said Pansy. She pulled the mushrooms towards her and began to chop.

There was a part of Ron felt the need to fill the silence that descended with small talk, but then, he was English and he hated small talk, so the other part of him did not. But then the quiet was so absolute that it was almost distracting. He wished their rooms weren't soundproof, even though he knew that Snape had made them that way so that they couldn't cheat. He would have killed for some background chatter. Some noise. Anything.

"So are you going to the Hufflepuff-Ravenclaw Quidditch match this weekend?" he blurted out before he could stop himself. Parkinson shrugged, her eyes still on the mushrooms she was cutting up.

"It depends on the weather," she said. "If it's nice I'll probably go, but if it's raining, then I really don't care about that game, to be honest. I mean, I love Quidditch and all, but when it's two teams that I'm honestly just ambivalent about, then I can't be arsed. How about you?"

As tempting as it was to respond with 'erm, same,' that would not keep the conversation going. And as he'd started it in the first place, he could at least put some effort into not letting it drop.

"Well, I'll probably go to scout out the competition," he said.

"Right, yes, I'd almost forgotten that you played," Pansy said.

"What?" Ron spluttered in outrage. "But you sang that horrid song about me! Weasley is our King? Remember?"

"That was more Draco," Pansy replied. "And it didn't work anyway."

"That's not the point, is it?" Pansy finally looked up at Ron.

"Then what is the point?" she asked a little more harshly than she had intended to. "I'm trying to be nice here." Ron looked as though he was about to interject so she added "or at least civil. You're the one trying to pick a fight."

"Me?" Ron fumed. "I just asked if you were going to watch the Quidditch!"

"And then I asked if you were."

"I don't think we need to rehash every part of our thirty second conversation to realize you were in the wrong," Ron said.

"I was in the wrong? How do you figure that? What, because I had temporarily forgotten that you played on the Gryffindor team, perhaps because I was distracted by the fact that I'm busy chopping up mushrooms and perhaps because really, _I_ _don't care_ , that makes me a mean and horrible person?"

"Precisely."

"Weasley, you are impossible," Pansy said, throwing up her hands. "Let's just try not talking, shall we?" And she looked pointedly back down at her mushrooms. Ron gaped at her for a moment before he turned his attention back to the liver. He glowered at it and it stared wetly back at him.

"Look, I'm sorry," he said after another long and uncomfortable silence had passed. "I know we're supposed to by trying to get along, but I have to admit that it's a little difficult when your lot have been so horrid to me and my friends for so long." Pansy took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

"You haven't always been the nicest to us," she said. She glanced up and met Ron's gaze. He was chewing his lip in agitation.

"I guess we can agree we've all been a bit rubbish to each other," he said. Pansy laughed.

"A bit?"

"Yeah," Ron said. "A bit and let's not dwell on exactly how much." Pansy smiled at him and nodded.

"Deal," she said. "You done with that liver yet?"

And this time, when they added their ingredients, their potion turned colors that were a tiny bit closer to what they were supposed to be.


	8. Chapter 8

This story was originally published from 2007-2010 before I removed it around 2012. Recently, I decided to rework it and republish it.

DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

I apologize that it has taken me, uh, 2 years (?) to continue this story, but I do plan on finishing it an updating it regularly.

* * *

"Now what?" Harry asked as he regretfully dropped Draco's hand. Their potion was the exact shade of chartreuse that it was supposed to be. Draco looked at it with pride.

"Now, I think I need to get back to my homework," Draco said. Harry tried not to let his disappointment show in his face.

"I suppose," he said. Something about the tone of his voice stopped Draco in his tracks and he turned to face the brunet.

"What?" he asked.

"You just seem so eager to get away," Harry said. He looked down at his shoes. They were scuffed and one of the laces was starting to unravel.

"Potter, you are impossible," Draco said, rolling his eyes. Harry looked up and grinned. "I really can't stay long though, because I do have work to do. And unlike you, I care about getting my homework in on time." Harry clapped his hands to his cheeks and pretended to look shocked.

"I care about getting my homework in on time," he said. Draco raised an eyebrow. "What? I haven't been late on an assignment in years." Draco left his eyebrow raised. "Or at least months." The blond's face relaxed into a smile. "I even brought my Herbology essay with me in case we wanted to stay here and work together." He reached into his bag and pulled out his books with a flourish.

"I repeat, you are impossible." But Draco was smiling as he said it.

He retrieved his own homework and they spent the next fifteen minutes working in silence across the table from each other. Then Harry noticed how close they were and how he wasn't sure if his foot was touching the leg of the man across from him or the leg of the table. He jiggled it experimentally.

"Playing footsie, Potter?" Draco asked without looking up from the Ancient Runes he was studying.

"No," Harry said. "Just seeing if that was you or the table."

"Sure you were."

"I was!" Harry protested. Draco looked up from his book and winked at him.

"I wouldn't mind either way," he said.

Silence descended again. Harry was surprised how easy it was to work in such a companionable fashion, both of them keeping to themselves and concentrating on their tasks. He looked down at his Herbology essay and realized that he had all but finished it. He stuck the end of his quill into his mouth and sucked on it thoughtfully before putting the nib back onto the parchment and scribbling out the last few sentences. He wondered if Ron was the main culprit behind his normal lack of concentration and he understood why Hermione always wanted to go to the library.

He was snapped out of his reverie by the feeling of a foot traveling up his calf and moving swiftly towards his inner thigh. He looked up sharply at Draco, but the blond was still studiously reading his runes book. Or was he? His eyes did not appear to be moving and he seemed like he was trying very hard not to laugh. The corners of his mouth were twitching with the effort.

"I beg your pardon, Malfoy? What was that you were saying about playing footsie?"

Draco snorted and put down his book. Harry felt the foot leave his leg. "I was just seeing if I could distract you."

"Well, clearly the answer here is yes."

"Good." And with that, Draco picked up his book again.

"Good?" Harry asked. "Good? That's it?" He signed and rolled up his finished essay. "And you say I'm the difficult one." He pushed his chair back from the table and rocked it onto the back two legs. He brought his arms up and laced his hands together behind the back of his head. Draco looked at him and narrowed his eyes.

"Does this nonchalant pose mean that you've finished your homework, Potter?" he asked. Harry winked. "Use your words like a big boy."

"Yes," Harry said. "I finished my Herbology essay. Because I am amazing like that."

"Good, then you can watch me do my Runes homework." Draco turned back to the papers and books in front of him. Harry started to pout but stopped himself. Making a fuss about being bored while Malfoy had work to do would surely put him back in poor graces with the blond. Instead he let his chair from forward again and reached into his bag. He pulled out another book and some more parchment. If he had the time, he might as well get started on his Transfiguration work that was due tomorrow. He rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck from side to side and then buried himself in work again.

Twenty minutes later he felt another foot traveling up his leg again. His head snapped up and he looked over at Malfoy. The blond was doing nothing to hide his glee and in fact was close to dissolving into silent giggles.

"Are you just trying to distract me?" he asked, laying down his quill.

"Maybe."

"Well, is it all it was cracked up to be? Distracting me, that is?"

"Yes," Draco said. His eyes glittered wickedly. "But it would be more fun if I got a more excited reaction." And with that, Harry felt Malfoy's foot travel straight to his crotch. He yelped in surprise and shoved his chair back from the table.

"Sorry," Harry stammered. "I… uh… It's not that I don't want…" he trailed off, unsure of what he did and did not want. He wanted Malfoy, that was for sure, but he did not want him in this context. Not right now. Not in this room that Snape had put together. He took a deep breath and tried to explain himself again because Draco was staring morosely at his Runes homework.

"I would prefer if those kinds of shenanigans progressed at a different time. And, uh, not in a room that Professor Snape created." To his surprise, Draco burst out laughing at that.

"Wow, Potter, way to kill the mood." Harry began to splutter his apology, but Draco cut him off. "I see your point. Though, I will also point out that we had a pretty major snogging session in here earlier today." Harry's face involuntarily spasmed at the word 'snogging'. "What? Is snogging not allowed either?"

"No, no. Kissing is most definitely allowed. I just can't stand the word snogging," he shuddered and made a face as he said the offending word. Draco laughed again.

"You are a special one, Potter," he said. He stood up and walked around the table until he was standing behind Harry's chair. He rested his hands on Harry's shoulders and then, feeling no resistance from the brunet, began to massage them. Harry groaned in pleasure and closed his eyes.

"Merlin, your shoulders are tense," Draco said after a moment.

"Lots of stress," Harry mumbled. "Big, bad dark wizard constantly trying to kill me."

"Oh, right. That."

"Yeah, it's a bit shit, to be honest."

"I can imagine."

"Can you really?"

"Yes, actually." Draco abruptly stopped the massage. Harry frowned and turned around to look at him. The blond was frowning at the floor.

"Draco?" Harry asked, bending so he could attempt to look into his eyes. Draco shook his head.

"It's nothing. I don't really want to talk about it." He turned away and instead went to sit on the couch. After a moment's hesitation, Harry scrambled out of his chair and went to sit next to him. He picked up one of Draco's hands from where it was resting on his leg and held it. Then he realized that action might be too invasive, but it was too late to change that, so he just kept holding it. He was surprised at how cold it was. They sat that way in silence for a bit.

"If you do want to talk about it," Harry said. "I am here. Really, I'm here either way." As soon as he said it, he thought it sounded stupid, but it was out there now. So he just continued to hold Draco's hand and Draco continued staring at the floor. After a few minutes, Draco shook himself.

"I should go," he said.

"You should stay," Harry replied.

"It's getting late," Draco pointed out with a yawn. "And we already had a late night last night." It took Harry a moment to realize that their date had been the previous night. It felt like more time had passed since then. And now that Malfoy had mentioned it, he was tired too. It might have been the power of suggestion, but as soon as the blond had yawned, he felt himself getting drowsy as well.

"Fine," he said. "I suppose you can go get your beauty sleep."

"You're the one that really needs it," Malfoy retorted.

"You wound me," Harry cried, snatching his hand away. Malfoy grinned. He leaned forward and pressed his lips to Harry's.

"Does kissing it better help?" he asked, pulling back and looking Harry straight in the eyes.

"Perhaps a little bit," Harry mumbled before leaning forward to kiss him properly. After a few lovely minutes, Draco pulled away.

"No more," he said. "It's bedtime."

"You are quite the tease," Harry said, but he winked at him.

…

"Where have you been?" Ron asked when Harry climbed through the portrait hole and into the Gryffindor common room ten minutes later. He had spent the walk back up to Gryffindor tower attempting to wipe the grin off his face, but the damn thing kept sneaking back onto his lips.

"Working," he replied. "I finished my Herbology essay."

"What? Seriously? Can I see it?" Ron appeared to be still halfway through his.

"Yes, seriously. And no, you cannot see it." Ron scowled and crossed his arms, seemingly oblivious to the fact that he was still holding his quill until he stabbed his arm with it. Harry sighed and walked over to the table where Ron was sitting and dropped into the chair next to his friend. He pulled Ron's essay toward him and read through what he had already written while Ron fussed with his sleeve and the ink that had been left on it by his quill.

"How did you finish your essay so quickly?" Ron ask once Harry stopped reading. Harry shrugged.

"I'm not really sure. I decided to take advantage of those soundproof rooms that Snape set up so that I could work without interruption. Not," he added quickly. "That I think you're a distraction." Ron narrowed his eyes and looked suspiciously at Harry.

"I think 'Mione's still in her pod too. Possibly for the same reason."

"Well, they are very quiet," Harry pointed out.

"Too quiet," Ron retorted. Harry shrugged and handed Ron his essay.

"Looks good so far. I think you just need a paragraph discussing some of dangers of working with henbane and then your conclusion and you're done." Ron frowned down at his essay.

"You're sure?"

"I mean, I'm not an expert, but you've at least covered all the points I did." Harry shrugged. He began to yawn mid-shrug, so he took this as a sign he should go to bed. He bade goodnight to Ron and then made his way up to the bedroom. After brushing his teeth, he fell into bed and into dreams filled with a particular blond haired Slytherin and a good deal of kissing.

…

"Hey Malfoy," Harry said the following morning at breakfast. "How's your mother doing? Is she lonely without your dear old daddy around?"

"Well, at least my mother's alive, Potter," Draco replied coldly. "Unlike yours." Harry felt as though he had been kicked in the stomach.

"What the fuck?" he asked.

"So articulate," Draco disparaged.

"Seriously though? You went there?"

"Yeah, Malfoy," Ron agreed. "That's low even for you." Hermione said nothing, only narrowed her eyes and shook her head. Draco bit his lip.

"I'm sorry, Harry," he said. Ron and Hermione exchanged confused looks. Next to them, Pansy and Blaise did the same.

"Fuck this," Harry said and he stormed off out of the Great Hall.

"Harry, wait," Draco called after him, but Harry ignored him and kept walking. Draco looked around at Pansy, Blaise, Ron and Hermione. "I have to go and apologize again." And he took off running after the brunet.

"You know how you asked whether there had been anything odd about Draco?" Blaise asked Hermione. "I guess I will now have to say yes." They all watched the pair depart the Great Hall for a moment before they looked around at each other and quickly followed them.

…

"Potter, wait," Draco said as he caught up with Harry in the Entrance Hall.

"What?" Harry snapped. He stopped walking but did not turn around to face Malfoy.

"I'm sorry."

"You should be." Draco walked around to face Harry and was surprised to see that there were tears shimmering in his eyes.

"I didn't mean to. It's just you said that thing about my mum-"

"-You bloody told me to say that."

"I know. I just - I saw red and tried to find the first thing I could say to hurt you."

"Well you succeeded. Happy?" Harry turned and started walking towards the front doors.

"No," Draco said. "I'm not happy. I-" At that moment he noticed that both his and Harry's friends had followed them into the entrance hall. "I'm, um… I'm furious." And he launched himself at Harry. He had just intended to hit the brunet, but Harry was taken off guard and they both fell to the ground, Draco on top of Harry. For a moment neither of them moved, stunned at suddenly being horizontal, but then Harry tried to push Malfoy off of him and Malfoy shoved him back and then before any of their friends could think to interfere, they were rolling around on the Entrance Hall floor, kicking, scratching and hitting any part of each other that they could reach.

At some point during their tussle, Harry felt the crotch of his trousers grow tight thanks to teenage hormones and the attractive man who, for all intents and purposes, was writhing around on top of him. Before he had time to push the blond off of him, he felt the tightness turn to euphoria and release as the pent up sexual tension of the last week unloaded itself on the inside of his trousers.

"Oh shit," he muttered. He froze and Draco managed to land a very solid punch on his jaw. "Ow," he said automatically, although his body had not really registered the pain so soon after his orgasm. He cringed as he felt semen slide down his leg. This was unfortunate. And it would be embarrassing if anyone found out. And, oh fuck, all of his friends were standing around watching their fight. As he looked around, he saw Neville and Seamus exit the Great Hall and walk over to see what the fuss was about. He wished the floor would open up and swallow him whole. The Seamus voice inside his head tried to make a joke about the word swallow, but he mentally swatted it aside.

Draco punched him in the jaw again before pushing himself off of Harry, suddenly aware that the other boy was no longer putting up any fight. Harry took the opportunity to fumble in his robes for his wand. Pointing it at his crotch, he mumbled 'scourgify'. And then he began to scream.

* * *

As ever, please review if you like it. The reviews feed my soul and encourage me to write more. You do want me to finish this story, do you not? ;)

...Riyan...


	9. Chapter 9

Draco jumped off of Harry and stared down at him in bewilderment. He had heard him mumble something but he was not sure what terrible jinx Harry had seemingly been trying to hit him with. He was glad the other boy had missed as he watched Harry curl into the fetal position, clutching between his legs. Hermione pulled out her wand and hurried over to Harry.

"Finite incantatum," she said, pointing her wand at the writhing boy. Harry stopped writhing and instead just lay still on the floor. "What did you do to him?" Hermione hissed, turning to face Draco. He backed away quickly, holding his hands up in surrender.

"Nothing," he protested, still backing away.

"I'll get Pomfrey," Ron said. He turned and sprinted up the marble staircase. Hermione crouched down next to Harry and put a hand on his shoulder. Harry was breathing hard, but whatever it was that had hurt him appeared to have stopped.

"Are you okay?" she asked gently. Harry shook his head.

"Ow," he said. Hermione snapped her head around and glared at Draco who had backed himself all the way up to the wall.

"Don't you even _think_ about going anywhere," she said.

"I wasn't."

"Because you have to tell Pomfrey exactly what you did to Harry."

"But I didn't _do_ anything. Harry did. He was trying to curse _me_." And in all honesty, Draco was a little hurt by this. He had thought they had been getting along quite well if the kissing had been any indication. But then, _of course_ , Draco had to go and stick his foot in his mouth and insult Harry's mother. So, perhaps in a perverse way, Draco _had_ done this to Harry. He sank down the wall to the floor and pulled his knees up to his chest.

"S'true," Harry muttered through gritted teeth. "He didn't do anything. 'Mione, can you get everyone to go away?"

"Of course, Harry." Hermione stood up and began to disperse the small crowd that had gathered around them. Draco made to stand up, but Hermione glared at him and he stayed sitting. "I don't care that you didn't curse him," she said. "You did still _hit_ him."

"I know,' he said miserably once the Entrance Hall was empty again. "I'm sorry." Hermione stared at him. "What? I'm sorry that I hit him. And scratched him. And kicked him." He paused and then realized how that did not in fact make it sound any better. "It was his idea," he added quickly. Harry groaned from the floor. "Alright, it was _my_ idea, but Harry agreed with me." Harry groaned again. "Oh, shush Harry. It's true. We both agreed that we had to have a very public fight." He scooted across the floor until he was sitting next to the other boy. He put a hand gently on his arm. "What did you do? What horrible pain were you trying to inflict on me?"

"I wasn't," Harry said. "I was just trying to-" But his explanation was interrupted by the arrival of Madame Pomfrey and a small brigade of house elves, who picked Harry up and ran him up the stairs.

"Come along," Pomfrey said, gesturing to Draco and Hermione. They looked at each other for a moment and then they both followed Pomfrey and the house elves to the hospital wing like some strange, sad parade.

…

"Right," Madame Pomfrey said once Harry had been deposited onto a bed. "Potter, what is it this time? What scrap have the pair of you gotten into now?" She peered down her nose at Draco. "What did you do to him, Mr. Malfoy?" Ron, who had walked over from where he had been pacing when they brought Harry in, crossed his arms and glared at Draco in what he hoped was a menacing manner.

"I… nothing," Draco stammered. "I mean, I hit him, but I didn't do any magic." He pulled out his wand and proffered it to the nurse. "Here, you can check."

"That won't be necessary. Harry is conscious, so it appears that he can tell us what happened." She turned to Harry who had resumed the fetal position, his hands clutched back around his still stinging crotch area.

"Well, Potter? What's wrong with you?" They all watched as Harry's face turned beet red in embarrassment. He muttered something so quietly that none of them could hear. Madame Pomfrey bent down next to him so that he could repeat what he had said in her ear. Draco watched as her face cycled through several expressions: concern, confusion, what seemed to be amusement and then back to concern. She straightened up, all business, and shooed Ron, Hermione and Draco away. As they backed away, she pulled out her wand and levitated a privacy curtain over to Harry's bed and then he was blocked from their view.

Draco sat down heavily on the closest bed and crossed his arms in front of him. Hermione looked down at him in both concern and interest.

"You're actually worried about him," she said. "Aren't you?" He hesitated for a moment before nodding. He slumped and then collapsed backwards on the bed, flopping his arms out wide to the side.

"I don't want to talk about it," he said.

"I wasn't asking you to." She sighed deeply and then perched on the end of the bed that he was sprawled on.

"If you're so concerned," Ron said, leaning over Draco and poking him forcefully on the chest. "Why did you curse him in the first place?"

"I didn't," Draco said. He was getting tired of having to protest his innocence over this matter. He sat up and folded his arms again.

"Well, then why did you hit him?" Hermione asked. "And why did you insult his mother?"

"Yeah," Ron agreed. "Why were you being such a arse? I mean, aside from the fact that you usually _are_ an arse."

Draco narrowed his eyes as he fought to keep his composure. It would not do to react negatively right after being told he'd been an arse, because on reflection, it was probably true. And really, it had been true for years. And if Potter hadn't gotten drunk and been dared to ask him out, Draco probably would have had some sort of similarly pointless fight with Harry anyway. He took a deep breath. He was going to have to tell them the truth and it was going to be awkward.

"Harry-and-I-are-kind-of-seeing-each-other," he said quickly and then looked down at his hands, not daring to look either of them in the eye.

"I'm sorry, what?" Hermione asked. Draco steeled himself and looked up at her.

"We're secretly kind of dating," he said more slowly. This had clearly not been what either of them had been expecting as both of their mouths dropped open in unison. "Surprise," he added, bringing his hands up and waving his fingers in what he had heard described as "jazz hands".

"So then why did you hit him?" Ron asked.

"To keep up appearances. As I said, we're _secretly_ dating. Kind of. I'm not really sure if you could call it dating, really. It's only been a few days. But we can't have the rest of the school finding out. Let alone the rest of the world. I mean, just imagine what the papers would say if they knew."

"So you figured if you had a loud, public fight then we would all still think you hated each other?" Hermione asked. Draco nodded.

"Well, it worked," Ron said. Draco allowed himself a small smile.

"Until you apologized," Hermione pointed out. "But that _was_ after everyone had left."

"Yes, well, he wasn't supposed to get hurt like this." Draco's forehead knotted in concern as he looked towards the privacy curtain. "How are you two so calm? He could be dying."

"He's not dying," Madame Pomfrey announced as she came back around the privacy curtain. "But he is in some discomfort. You may see him now." She bustled off and the three of them fought to see who could get to Harry first, jostling each other out of the way as they made their way behind the curtain.

Harry was pale and had the blankets pulled all the way up to his chin, but he was awake and alert again, and no longer in the fetal position.

"Oh, Harry," Draco and Hermione cried at the same time, both of them rushing to his side and attempting to hold his hands. Ron watched them with a bemused smile on his face. He could tell that he was going to have trouble getting used to this other side of Malfoy that the blond seemingly had. Who knew he could be civil? Or that he even had a tone of voice that was warmer than his usual icy timbre?

"I'm fine, guys," Harry said.

"What happened?" Draco asked. "What horrible curse did you try to hit me with?" He straightened up, crossed his arms in from to his chest and frowned down at Harry. To his surprise he watched Harry's face turn red in embarrassment again and he squirmed uncomfortably under the covers.

"It wasn't a curse. It was," and then he mumbled the rest of his sentence into the duvet.

"Harry," Hermione said, immediately adopting the demeanor of a mothering hen. "You can tell us. It's ok. We're your friends."

"Yeah, Draco already mentioned you two were, ah, involved," Ron added, perhaps a little coldly.

At this statement, Harry pulled the covers up over his head and hid from them. Draco looked back and forth between Ron and Hermione. Neither of them seemed to have a clue what was going on either, which made him feel a bit better. But he was also getting impatient. He reached over and yanked the blanket down from Harry's head.

"Oh come on, Potter," he snapped. "What happened?"

Harry looked up at the three of them and shook his head.

"I can't," he squeaked. "It's too embarrassing."

"Was it an engorging charm?" Draco hazarded. It was the first thing he could think of that might be embarrassing and/or painful in the lap area. Ron sputtered with laughter.

"No!" Harry cried. "It was nothing like that!"

"Well, what then?" Draco asked. Harry sighed, deflating as he resigned himself to the humiliation.

"It was a cleaning charm. I got a little, ah, excited in all the rolling around on the floor."

"Oh my," Draco said. He was both amused and horrified at this - horrified only at the cleaning spell, of course. Ron stopped laughing and looked pained.

"What did you use?" he asked. "Tergeo?" He leaned down close to Harry and continued speaking softly in the hopes that Hermione would not hear (though she did). "Because between you and me, mate, that's what I use and this has never happened to me." Harry shook his head, looking miserable.

"I used the first one that came to mind. Scourgify," he said.

"Oh, shit. Ouch," Ron said. "Harry, I'm sorry. I feel like I've let you down as a best friend, not teaching you the right 'male clean up after yourself' spells." Harry shook his head.

"No, Ron. You explained the spells to me. I just panicked and used the wrong one." He slapped a hand to his forehead. "Merlin, I feel so stupid." Hermione patted him gently on the arm.

"It's ok, Harry," she said. "Accidents happen. And it's not like this is the first time Malfoy has sent you to the hospital wing." At this, Harry looked over at Draco whose mouth had dropped open in hurt surprise. "What?" Hermione asked, glancing at him. "You both know it's true. I'm just glad that this time you weren't hurt out of malice. I mean, aside from the large bruise you've got developing there." She touched him gently on the side of his face and he flinched.

"You should see the other guy," Harry joked. Draco's hands flew to his face in immediate concern and he glanced around wildly, looking for a mirror. Hermione rolled her eyes at him.

"Malfoy, your face is fine. It's nothing that Madame Pomfrey can't fix when she comes back." She glanced over at the clock on the far wall of the hospital room and flinched in surprise. "Ooh, Harry. I have to run. I've got Arthimancy in fifteen minutes and I need to get to class. Feel better." She squeezed his hand and then began to hurry out of the hospital wing.

Ron made up the first excuse that came to his mind so as not to get stuck with the pair of them alone.

"I need to go see a man about a dog," he said and scampered after Hermione.


	10. Chapter 10

"Really, Harry," Draco scolded as soon as they were alone. "Scourgify? It's like you've never had to clean yourself up under pressure before."

"Well, I haven't," Harry said.

"What? No one has ever walked in on you playing with your little soldier?" Harry spluttered with laughter.

" _My little soldier_? Really, Draco? You call your dick _that_?"

"It makes perfect sense. It stands to attention, gets called into action, then falls down after la petite mort. It's a great euphemism."

"If you say so." Harry remained unconvinced, but they were interrupted at this point by Madame Pomfrey who bustled back behind the curtain, carrying a jar of ointment.

"Right, Potter," she said. "This is to help with the pain and to promote the healing of the skin. I want you to use it for at least the next five days, and during that time you are to refrain from any nonessential contact down there." She took a moment to stare pointedly at Harry and then, to Draco's surprise, at Draco as well. "You took off several layers of skin with that spell, and skin takes time to grow back and heal - even for wizards. And as the area in question is a rather sensitive one, that I am _sure_ you would like to heal properly, I have opted not to 'wave my wand and fix it' so to speak, but instead to let the skin repair itself more naturally. If I were you, I would try to refrain from, ah, overstimulating yourself for the next week, if you get my meaning. The skin will be very tender and it is likely that any contact, stretching or pulling on it will be uncomfortable. Do you understand?"

"Yes," Harry said, although all he wanted her to do was to 'wave her wand and fix it' and not talk about any stretching or pulling. It was the most excruciatingly embarrassing post injury talk she had ever given him and it was made all the worse by the fact that Draco was standing there and listening to the entire thing.

"Good, now let's patch up the rest of you." She pulled out her wand and began to heal his various bruises, cuts and scratches. Once she was finished with Harry, she turned her attention to Draco, who did not have nearly so many bruises. When she was done, she stepped back and looked at the pair of them, with her hands on her hips.

"Now," she said. "Remember what I said Harry - no contact for at least a week and use your ointment once a day, or more if you need it for the discomfort. Come back and see me if it gets worse. You're free to go once you re-dress yourself. And boys," she added. "Try to stay out of the hospital wing this year." Then she turned on her heel and left them alone again.

"Well," Draco said once she had gone. "If the sexual tension had been high before, I think it's going to, if anything, be even higher."

"How do you reckon that?" Harry asked. He had not yet moved to get redressed as Draco was still there and Harry was wearing nothing under his hospital gown.

"Well, now I have to actively try not to flirt with you, or kiss you, or anything like that. And it's going to be very difficult. Even if it's for your own good." Harry wasn't sure he followed the logic. Really, if they just carried on as they had been, he would be fine.

On second thoughts, how they had been getting along was how he has gotten himself into this mess.

But really, was kissing out of the question? He wanted to voice this question to Draco but he also somewhat wanted Draco to go so that he could get dressed. He looked around for his clothes and spotted them on his bedside table. He reached over and picked them up.

"Uh, in the meantime," he said, looking pointedly down at his clothes. "I should, uh, perhaps get dressed again."

"Of course, of course," Draco said. "Did you need some help with that?" He walked over and began to reach for the ties of Harry's gown. Harry swatted his hand away.

"That was not what I meant," he snapped. "Can you give me some privacy please? I'm not quite ready for you to see me without a shirt." Draco slapped a hand to his forehead.

"Of course," he said again, looking guilty this time, and then he made his way back outside of the privacy curtain.

As soon as he was out of Harry's eye-line he shook his head and rolled his eyes at himself. _Of course_ Harry wanted privacy. How could he not have thought about that? It was far too early in their budding relationship for Harry to feel comfortable undressing in front of him. Or, at least in a situation where Draco himself was not also undressing.

He sighed and looked over at the clock. Hermione had been right, it was time for lessons, but Draco was in no rush to get to them. He had the valid excuse of having been in the hospital wing and it would be silly not to milk that excuse for as long as possible.

Harry emerged from behind the curtain ten minutes later, fully dressed and walking gingerly. Draco hurried over to help him, but Harry waved him away.

"I'll be fine," he said. "Just waiting for the ointment to start working. I'm not quite sure how it works, but I suppose it takes a few minutes to absorb."

"You know, I could help you put the ointment on, if you needed me to," Draco suggested as they began walking. He immediately regretted being so forward but the comment was out there. Harry winced and shook his head.

"I don't think that's a good idea," he said. "For two reasons. Firstly, the whole point is to _not_ turn me on, and that most definitely would. And secondly, because I don't want to scar you with images of how horrible it looks. Oh and I guess thirdly, I don't want your first impression of my, ah nether regions, to be all red and inflamed." It was rather worse than just red and enflamed, but Harry was decidedly _not_ going to tell Draco that.

"That's fair. What class do you have now?" Draco asked, quickly changing the topic.

"I have a free period, during which I need to finish my Transfiguration homework that's due later today."

"I thought you had finished all your work yesterday," Draco said.

"Well, I had planned on using this time for my Transfiguration homework, so I _was_ finished with my work for the evening. But I was thinking that I might go to our little privacy pod. Ron won't be there, so I can work without distraction."

"Ouch, throwing Weasley under the bus there, aren't you?"

"Have _you_ tried doing work while he's in the room? I love Ron - he's great - but he's a chatterbox and I don't have time for his blathering on right now."

"Right," Draco said, as they reached the marble staircase. "Well, I will see you later then. I'm off to Ancient Runes." He jogged away down the stairs. Harry watched him go and then made his way gingerly down to the dungeons, wincing with every step.

…

The rest of the day passed uneventfully for Harry, until dinnertime, at which point, Ron sat down opposite him, crossed his arms and glared at him.

"Harry," he said. "You and I need to talk." Harry squirmed under the look that Ron was giving him and meekly nodded.

"OK, Ron," he said.

"Don't worry. I'll wait until we're no longer in public." Ron uncrossed his arms and began to pile food onto his plate. Harry looked down at his own dinner, no longer as hungry as he had been just moments ago.

He knew what Ron wanted to talk about. It was a conversation he had been dreading from the moment his lips had touched Draco's in the tunnel on the way back from Hogsmeade. Draco may have been worried what his father would think, but Harry was immediately worried about his friends' opinions.

In hindsight, he should have realized that he and Draco could not keep it a secret forever, so perhaps he should have started dropping small comments about how perhaps the Slytherin wasn't nearly so bad as they all thought he was. But then that would have interfered with their plan to have a giant fight to convince everyone that it was business as usual between them.

Harry pushed a pea around his plate and risked a glance up at Ron. Ron was frowning down at his roast beef and did not notice him. Harry could already see the look of disgust that would grace Ron's face as he berated Harry for his choice in boyfriend.

' _Seriously, Harry, Malfoy?"_ mental image Ron said in his head. ' _Couldn't you have dated a Ravenclaw or a Hufflepuff? Or even, I don't know,_ Seamus _? Why did it have to be Malfoy? The person who has tormented me and my family for years? And he's tormented you. What do you even see in Ferretface, Harry? He's just a no-good, good-for-nothing slime ball._ ' Harry slumped down in his seat, resigning himself to this being just an absolutely terrible day - what, with almost scourgify-ing his own balls off and now this sure to be berating from Ron.

"Are you okay, Harry?" Hermione asked as she sat down next to him. "You look a bit down. Is it-" she lowered her voice "-is it your, you know what?" She glanced briefly down towards his lap and blushed crimson. Harry nodded. It was not all together untrue. His 'little soldier', as Draco would call it, was throbbing, and not in a good way, but the real source of his misery was a thing that had not happened yet. He tried to tell himself that the conversation would be alright, but he didn't quite believe his own lie.

"I'll be fine," he said. "I have the ointment from Pomfrey."

"Oh, Harry," Hermione soothed, rubbing him on the back. "I'm sorry this happened to you."

"S'ok, 'Mione. I did this to myself after all." He gave her a half hearted smile. At this point, he felt something crawl up his leg and he gave a start. He looked down and saw that it was a piece of paper shaped like a crab. He snatched it up before Hermione could see and quickly unfolded it.

 _Are you OK? The expression on your face makes it look like you think the world is ending._ The note said.

Harry looked around and saw Draco staring at him from the Slytherin Table, surrounded by books and paper. As Harry did not have a quill handy, he looked Draco in the eye and gave a small nod instead. Draco's mouth twisted and his eyes narrowed in disbelief, but he broke Harry's gaze and went back to his dinner. Harry looked back down at his plate, decided that he was not going to eat any more and stood up.

"I'm going up to the common room," he said to no one in particular, and then gathered up his things. He made his way slowly up to the common room, mentally preparing himself for the verbal barrage that was sure to greet him when Ron arrived.


	11. Chapter 11

"Harry, there you are," Ron said as he entered the 6th Year boys' room. Harry, who had been lying on his bed waiting for the ache between his legs to dissipate, jumped. He sat up quickly.

"Before you say anything," he said. He had been thinking about what to say to Ron since he had lain down on his bed. "I just want to say, that Draco isn't really the jerk we all think he is. I mean, he can be, but he can also be nice. Just like we can be jerks or we can be nice. I know you think he's a slime ball and a good-for-nothing-"

"-Can I stop you there?" Ron interjected. Harry snapped his mouth shut. "Look, Harry." He walked over to Harry's bed and sat down on the edge of it. "While I am not overly thrilled that you are dating Draco Malfoy, who you date is none of my business."

"I don't know if I would call it dating," Harry said. "We've been on one date."

"Well, be that as it may, who you date is none of my business. I'm just upset that you didn't tell me about it. I mean, I had to find out from _Malfoy himself_." Ron made a horrified face. Harry let out a breath that he did not realize he had been holding. Ron seemed almost OK with the fact that he was seeing Draco. That was unexpected.

"You're right, Ron," Harry said. Because he was. "I'm sorry. I should have told you. I just didn't know how to bring it up. I mean, it wasn't even a week ago when we all still hated each other."

"How did it happen?" Ron asked. "This whole dating thing, I mean."

"Seamus."

"Seamus?"

"Yes, Seamus dared me."

"Ah, yes, I remember that. But I thought Malfoy said no."

"He did. But then, you know how Snape _always_ pairs us in Potions?" Ron gave a bark of laughter.

"Yes, I think he's been trying to get you two to get together for years."

"Ew, really?"

"Well, perhaps just as friends. But go on."

"Yes, well, we were talking about how I had asked him out as a dare, and, I don't know - we had a lot of banter, and I thought why not ask him out again? It could be fun. The banter that potions lesson was kind of fun, perhaps it would be nice to not always be at each other's throats." (Or, said the Seamus voice in Harry's head, to be at each others throats for the purpose of trailing kisses down them). "So we snuck out to the Three Broomsticks on Tuesday night and we had a really nice time."

"So _that's_ where you were on Tuesday!" Harry nodded.

"Yeah, we made out in the tunnel on the way back."

"Harry, I do not need those kinds of details," Ron said, holding a hand up.

"Well, and now Snape has paired for this six week project."

"In a soundproof room," Ron added, waggling his eyebrows. Harry shoved Ron playfully on the shoulder.

"It's not like that," Harry protested.

"Yeah, ok."

"It's not! We've only made out there once."

"What did I say about the details!"

"You're impossible!" Harry cried, throwing up his arms. "One minute, it's no details, the next minute you're implying I'm having sex in a private room!"

"Who's having sex in a private room?" asked another voice from the middle of the room. Harry and Ron spun around to see Seamus who had clearly just walked in on the conversation.

"Uh, nothing," Harry said quickly. "I mean no one. What? Uh, hi Seamus." He put a hand up and awkwardly scratched the back of his head, his elbow stuck out to the side.

"Harry, I thought you were single," Seamus said. "And now I hear you're kissing people in private, soundproof rooms." Seamus put one hand on his hip and wagged a finger at Harry with the other.

"How much of our conversation did you hear, Seamus?" Harry asked carefully.

"Oh, just enough to infer that a certain Slytherin may have taken you up on that date I dared you to ask him on." There was a knowing gleam in Seamus's eyes. Harry groaned.

"Please don't tell anyone, Seamus," he said, taking a step towards the Irishman.

"Why would I?" Seamus asked. He looked as excited as if he had just been told he would be getting the biggest present under the tree at Christmas.

"Because you'd had too much to drink?" Harry hazarded.

"Harry, you wound me, but I am too pleased with my matchmaking skills to be upset with you."

"I beg your pardon?"

"I set you up."

"But he said no when you dared me to ask him."

"Well, he clearly didn't say no for long."

"Well, no, but…"

"So I set you up."

Ron was watching their verbal sparring match with interest, his head turning from Harry to Seamus as though he were watching that Muggle sport Hermione had shown him with the net and the big mesh spoons.

"Maybe," Harry relented.

"Wonderful! How's it going? From what I heard you had _not_ slept with him in your private potions room."

"Ah, no, I have not. Nor have we at all. We've just-"

"-Details," Ron cried, shoving his fingers into his ears. "I'll leave you two to it." And with that, he quickly hurried out of the room. Once he had left, Seamus grabbed Harry's hand and pulled him over to his bed.

"Sit," he said. "And tell me everything." Harry rolled his eyes, but complied with the sitting part of Seamus's command.

"Well, I near as well cursed my own dick off today," Harry said. The grin dropped from Seamus's.

"Right, yes, your fight," he said. "What happened? We were all shooed away by Hermione after you started screaming."

"It's too embarrassing, Seamus," Harry protested. He covered his face with his hands and flopped backwards on the bed. He just wanted this day to end. It had been a complete rollercoaster of emotions from lust to anger to pain to shame. At least it seemed that Malfoy actually liked him. After all, the blond had stayed with him in the hospital wing and had actually seemed concerned about his wellbeing. Harry was not sure what to do with this information. In all honesty, he was not quite sure how it made him feel. His stomach knotted at the thought that Malfoy at least somewhat cared for him, but he was not sure if the knot was from stress or excitement.

"Is it more embarrassing than the time I was caught trying to sneak into the Prefect's bathroom with Zacharias Smith?" Seamus asked, snapping Harry out of his reverie. "When both of us were half naked, and the only reason we still had trousers on was because we were so drunk we couldn't figure out how belts worked?"

"Almost."

"Oh. Shit. Do tell." Harry shook his head vigorously. "Oh, come on, Har. It's me. Your best gay friend. Or your gay best friend. Whichever order of words you prefer. I mean, after all, Harry, you did come out to me first."

"That was because you kissed me, Seamus."

"And you kissed back."

"That's not the point."

"It wasn't my point either. _My point was_ that you can tell me things. Like this embarrassing thing that happened to you. Because I tell you _my_ embarrassing things. Like that time that Justin Finch Fletchley and I were caught snogging in a broom closet." Harry, as usual, flinched at the word snogging.

"Seamus, I feel like both of these examples are things that you did that _everyone_ knows," Harry said. Seamus threw up his hands in defeat.

"Fine, fine," he said. "Did I tell you about that time that Justin Finch Fletchley caught me with Cormac McLaggen in the Quidditch team showers? We were both starkers and, well, you get the picture." At this point, Seamus made a motion with his hands that made it quite clear to Harry what the pair had been doing to each other.

"Uh, no, Seamus," Harry said. "You had not mentioned this to me."

"Well, it was awkward at first," Seamus said. "Justin slapped me and called me some names, which was fair as this was only a few days after the broom closet incident. Cormac made some excuse, grabbed his towel and left. Justin, by this point, was all wet from the showers and the tears, so I had to kiss him to cheer him up. And, well, one thing led to another, and I was already naked, and his clothes were wet, so they had to come off and-"

"-Seamus, again, this doesn't sound all that embarrassing. This just sounds like you relating another one of your escapades."

"Oh, does it?" Seamus asked. He did not even have the decency to look ashamed. "Well, long story short, Cormac had forgotten to wash the shampoo out of his hair, so he came back to find us in flagrante delicto."

"Oh dear," Harry said. Seamus decided to stop the story there before Harry decided that it was not in fact an embarrassing story as Cormac, after pouting profusely and pointing out that he was also naked and, ahem, willing, joined in the fun again.

"Yes, it was quite embarrassing," Seamus agreed.

"Well, that puts my day somewhat in perspective."

"So what happened?" Harry sighed and scooted further back onto the bed, pulling his legs up to sit cross legged. Seamus did the same and then reached over and picked up Harry's hand and held it between his. "It's ok, Harry." Harry took a deep breath.

"So, you saw our fight earlier, yes?"

"Who didn't?" Harry winced.

"Well, as you know, there was a lot of rolling around on the floor."

"I think I see where this is going," Seamus said. "But go on."

"And, well, damn hormones being what they are," Harry started.

"And Malfoy being as attractive as he is," Seamus added. A flare of jealousy went through Harry, taking him by surprise.

"Yes, that," he grudgingly agreed. "And then one thing led to another and I was left feeling rather happier and having a mess I needed to clean up."

"Ah, I see," Seamus said. There was a glint of amusement in the Irishman's eyes.

"But then I used scourgify instead of tergeo to clean myself up and then-" Seamus's face is so pinched with sympathy pain that Harry feels he does not need to keep going, so he just adds "ow." Seamus squeezes the hand of Harry's that he is holding.

"Merlin, that's rough," Seamus said. "Are you going to be alright? Or is the savior of the wizarding world a eunuch now?"

"I said I _nearly_ cursed my dick off, not that I actually did. It'll heal, though right now it is _very_ tender." Seamus winced. "Pomfrey gave me an ointment and it should be better in a week."

"Oh!" Seamus exclaimed. "Just in time for Halloween!"

"Is it?" Harry had not been paying much attention to the calendar. He had been vaguely aware that it was October, but Halloween, as usual, had snuck up on him. "You mean I only have a week to come up with a brilliant and also culturally relevant costume?" Seamus nodded. "Damn."

Well, at least _that_ would hopefully distract him from thoughts of a certain blond Slytherin.


	12. Chapter 12

When Harry came down to breakfast the next morning, it was as if the school had also suddenly realized the Halloween was the following week, as overnight the Great Hall had been covered in jack-o'-lanterns and steams of fake cobwebs. Conversations were alight with halloween costume ideas. Though he had thought about it for a while before going to sleep the night before, he had not come up with anything concrete yet.

"I think I might be Austin Powers," he heard Seamus say as he sat down at the Gryffindor table. Harry had recently been surprised that so many wizards seemed quite well versed in recent muggle movies despite having little knowledge of other muggle entertainment, but then Ron had excitedly shown him the latest in magical technology: moving picture books with sound. And so some muggle movies were now in wide release in the wizarding world. This made coming up with a costume much easier for both Harry and any muggle born students who had not grown up with any wizarding entertainment.

"Is that because you want to go around the party asking everyone if you make them horny?" Hermione asked. For a second she looked very serious, but then a small smile crossed her lips.

"Of course," Seamus replied. "I'm hoping the alcohol loosens everyone's tongues and they will tell me the truth. I'm desperate to know if Blaise fancies me."

"Are you?" Hermione asked, archly. Harry looked up from the pancakes he was piling onto his plate. Hermione was giving Seamus a strange, calculating look that piqued Harry's curiosity. He filed that information away for later as it would be a conversation best had away from the whole group, particularly Ron.

"Among others."

"Of course," she said. Her expression softened back into one of quiet amusement.

"How about you, 'Mione?" Ron asked. "What are you thinking about for your costume?" Hermione tilted her head from side to side and played with her fruit salad while she thought about it.

"I'm not sure," she said eventually.

"You could always be the Vanessa to my Austin," Seamus suggested. "You would look great in that silvery mini-dress." Hermione laughed, blushing. "And Ron could be Dr. Evil."

"I'm going to give that one a hard pass, Shame," Ron said.

"You don't have the balls to be bald?" Seamus asked. He elbowed Ron good-naturedly in the ribs.

"Nothing of the sort. I just have an idea already that I am very excited about. Which is top secret so don't ask."

"You're no fun," said Seamus and instead turned his attention to Harry. "Would you be our Dr. Evil, Har?"

"I'll think about it," Harry said, all the while telling himself that no, no he would not. Seamus shrugged, content at the possible commitment to his costume idea.

"I am serious, Hermione," he reiterated. "I think that would be a great costume for you."

"I might take you up on that," she said, tossing her hair over her shoulder and laughing.

"Harry," Ron said, catching Harry's attention again. "If you've finished your breakfast," which Harry had not, "can we head to potions early? I want to run my costume idea past you." Harry gave a small sigh and looked down at his little stack of pancakes.

"Give me one minute," he said and began to shovel them into his mouth. It was a shame, really. They were fluffy and buttery and smothered in syrup and Harry was not savoring them in the slightest. Still, he was not going to Double Potions on an empty stomach and he felt a little indebted to Ron for not having told him about dating Malfoy (if what they were doing could be called dating).

He looked up from his plate to find both Hermione and Seamus staring at him in disgust. He shrugged and pushed his plate away. Ron bounced up from his seat and they left the Great Hall together.

"So," Ron said as they entered the Great Hall. "I had a great costume idea, but it's a duo costume idea and so I was wondering if we could do a best friends costume?" He looked at Harry with large, puppy dog eyes and Harry smiled, feeling a warm rush of friendship wash over him.

"Of course, Ron," he said. Then he remembered some of Ron's previous Halloween costumes (the year he dressed up as a muggle postman stuck out in particular) and he added. "Within reason."

"Great," Ron said. His enthusiasm had not been not dimmed by the follow up comment. He pulled Harry to the side of the hall and whispered his idea, then he stood back and watched Harry's face for a reaction.

Harry was pleasantly surprised at Ron's choice of costume and he was even more pleased that he now did not have to think of a costume for himself.

"I love it," he said, a grin spreading across his face. Ron punched a fist into the air in excitement and then high fives Harry.

"Brilliant," he said. And they walked the rest of the way to Potions, chattering excitedly about their costume.

…

"Good morning, class," Severus Snape said, sweeping into the classroom. All conversations ceased immediately. Severus smiled to himself. He always felt important when that happened. "Today you will be adding your first rune to your potions." He looked around at the assembled students. They stared back at him in rapt attention. "Therefore, Professor Babbling has returned to walk us through the correct method of inscribing the first Rune and the best way to then incorporate the rune into your potions." He stepped aside as Bethsheda Babbling made her way to the front of the classroom.

Severus always enjoyed this part of teaching the sixth years, the long weeks long brewing periods where he could be a bit more hands off with the students. It had the dual effect of giving him more free time and giving the students a taste of independence, which he found often improved their overall potions skills.

Of course, this year, he was trying something new with the Ehwaz brew, in pairing up students from different houses. But it had been Dumbledore's idea, and though the man had many crazy sounding ideas, they often turned out to be good ones. And Severus trusted Dumbledore. They both knew that Voldemort was back and was trying to create fissures in the wizarding community again, so Dumbledore had theorized that creating unity at Hogwarts was the best way to combat this. They hoped that by promoting understanding of other points of view might lead to more empathy on the parts of students who might previously have held more narrow views of what it meant to be a witch or wizard.

But for now his job was to watch the pairs of students and hope that none of the pairs tried to kill (or maim) each other. His main concern had been the Potter-Malfoy pairing, despite the fact that he had paired them constantly in previous lessons (for fun). In fact, it was because he had paired them (disastrously) so many times before, that he had been concerned about pairing them for this project, but so far, they had proven to be a decently cooperative pair. Perhaps the old man knew more than he was letting on. Severus had gone into each of the pairs' rooms and checked on their potions and Potter and Malfoy's potion had been by far one of the better looking ones at this stage. He hoped this upward trend would continue. He was loathe to be the professor who taught the only subject the bloody boy savior failed in his quest to become an Auror.

Professor Babbling began to lecture and Severus began to pace the room, watching to ensure that the students were taking the proper notes. Unsurprisingly Granger was scribbling down everything Beth was saying, even though Beth had confided in Snape that she was one of the top Runes students. Because of course she was. Weasley had a look of mild terror on his face as Beth recounted one of the many ways that adding a Rune to a potion could go wrong. Longbottom chewed his lip nervously as Beth moved onto some of the more insidious ways that a Rune could affect a potion. Even Malfoy, who had napped through Beth's first lecture, looked concerned. This was good. They were all just the right amount of concerned that they would be cautious with their Runes, but not so scared that they would do nothing.

"Thank you, Professor Babbling," Severus said as she finished her lecture. "That was, as ever, very informative." He gave her what he hoped was a warm smile. She nodded curtly in response and moved to the side of the classroom. "Both the professor and I will be on hand to help you with your first rune. We would like to stress that you should not rush this. In fact, the rest of the sixth year classes have been canceled so that you can spend the rest of your day ensuring that this step is done properly." Granger's hand shot up and Severus resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "Yes, Miss Granger?"

"What do we do if we finish early? Can we go to the lessons we would otherwise be missing?"

"If," he said, straining, and most likely failing, to keep the dislike out of his voice. "You finish early, then your weekend begins early. There are no other sixth year classes today." The swot had the gall to look disappointed. Sometimes he wondered what she did for fun, if anything. Excited muttering broke out over the prospect of free time. Severus wondered how many of them would actually finish with any time left in their day. Perhaps this class would surprise him, but in previous years, most pairs had ended up staying late.

…

"How are you feeling?" Draco asked Harry under his breath as he slid into the seat next to Harry in the potions classroom. Ron, who was sitting on the other side of Harry, leaned forward and glared pointedly at him.

"You can't sit with us," Harry said. He tried to convey the thought of 'because most of the school thinks we hate each other' with his face, but he was neither a skilled Legillimens nor particularly good at conveying complex thoughts with his face and so it failed.

"Yeah," Ron said. "Go sit with the Slytherins for the lecture portion of the class." He too tried to convey that Malfoy and Harry were supposed to still appear enemies with his eyes, and he also failed.

"But," Draco started to say.

"You can't sit with us!" Harry cried, his voice shrill. Draco raised an eyebrow, but didn't say anything as he stood up and walked over to where Pansy and Blaise had just sat down. Harry felt a twinge of guilt, but he would explain it to Draco once they were alone in their private room. His stomach turned over in anticipation of being alone in their room and he marveled how how smitten he had become with Draco in the past few days. (But hadn't he always _kind of_ had an obsession with the blond?) He glanced over to where Draco had sat down and was rewarded with a sneer, which hurt more than he thought it ought to.

He pulled out a piece of parchment and his quill, ostensibly to be prepared for the lesson to begin, but in reality it was to scribble a quick apology to Draco.

At that moment, Snape swept into the room and silence descended.

 _I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be mean,_ Harry scrawled. _I was just trying to keep up appearances._ He drew a small frowning face beside the full stop at the end of his sentence. Then he drew a golden snitch in the corner of the note before folding it up and discreetly spelling it across the room. Moments later he received the note back. Below his apology was a single word.

 _Dick_.

Harry frowned. He was decently sure that Draco meant it as an insult. But he could also be referring to the fact that Harry had just essentially just flayed his own dick while they were keeping up appearances. And thus saying that they shouldn't be keeping up appearances?

Or, he could be hinting at something to do with sex? That was less likely, Harry knew, but a boy could hope. Though, in all fairness, Harry had to wait a few days before he could even think to hope.

He risked a glance back at Draco, who returned his stare cooly, which left Harry even more confused. He decided it was best to wait until they were alone and turned his attention back to Snape and Professor Babbling who were now lecturing them on adding the first rune to their potions. He chewed nervously on the end of his quill and took notes the best that he could, but by the time they had finished talking, Harry was no more sure what the rune for Yew was than he was how to add it to their potion properly.

"Potter," Draco said, nodding curtly at him as they made their way into their potions room.

"Hi," Harry said. His arms were full of books and parchment and his ink pot was perched precariously on the top of the pile. Draco pushed past him to get to the door first and Harry went sprawling down the corridor, books, papers, and ink flying everywhere. Daphne Greengrass shrieked as a glob of ink hit her square on the face, turning her cheek blue.

At the sound, Professor Snape swept into the hallway. He took one look at the mess - Harry on the floor, papers and ink everywhere, and Draco standing against the wall with his arms crossed, looking smug. Harry looked up sheepishly.

"I tripped," he said. Snape said nothing for a moment, only stared at Harry down his long, hooked nose. Then he pulled out his wand and gathered up the papers with a swish and a muttered incantation. Harry picked himself up off of the floor and gratefully took his things back from Snape. With another wave of his wand, the spilled ink returned itself to the ink pot and Snape placed it back on top of the pile.

"Do try to be less clumsy in the future, Potter," he said and then swept back into the classroom. Harry pressed his lips together in irritation but said nothing as he followed Draco into their room.

"What was that?" he snapped as soon as the door closed behind him.

"Keeping up appearances," Draco replied. He smirked and Harry had to fight off the desire to hit him. To be honest, he did not know if he wanted to hit Draco or kiss him. And he didn't know how the latter would go down even if he tried. He frowned and flounced over to the table where he set his notes down. He searched through them and found his notes from the lecture.

"Right," he said. "Let's get to work." He paused as he frantically read through his notes again, trying (mostly in vain) to make sense of them. He looked up to find Draco watching him with interest. "What?"

"That's it?" Draco asked. His tone was incredulous.

"What's it?"

"We're not going to talk about what just happened?"

"Why would we?" Draco's eyebrows shot up his forehead. "What? You just explained it." He turned back to his notes. Draco breathed out angrily through his nose. Harry was not sure what Draco was so annoyed about. _He_ had been the one to fall over. He supposed he should be grateful he had left this session of keeping up appearances without serious injury.

"Potter, you are impossible," Draco said. He turned and stalked out of the room. Harry gaped at the door like a fish, unsure what they were fighting about or even if they were fighting at all.


	13. Chapter 13

Harry was still standing with his mouth open when Draco walked back into the room a minute later, carrying his own notes.

"Close your mouth, sweetie," Draco said, glancing over at him. "You look like a trout." Harry glared at him and pressed his lips together in a scowl. "Oh, don't give me that look."

"Well, what look am I supposed to give you?" Harry snapped. Draco's mouth twisted to the side in irritation. Then he took a deep breath and walked over to Harry, who narrowed his eyes and watched him with suspicion. Harry was very surprised, therefore, when Draco leaned over and kissed him hard on the lips.

But it didn't take him long to get over his surprise and instead get very into the kiss. Before either of them could think about the situation much, they were pressed together, hands roaming across torsos and tongues battling for real estate. Until, of course, Harry began to get too excited and instead ran cringing to the sofa, clutching his nether regions.

"Oh shit," Draco said. "I'm so sorry."

"It's ok," Harry said through gritted teeth. His shoulders were hunched in pain. "I just need to use more of the ointment. Would you mind fetching it from my bag?" Draco nodded.

"Where is it?" he asked, looking around. He spotted it next to the desk and bent down to rummage through it. Harry could not help but notice how nicely his trousers hugged his arse, and looked away quickly as that realization did not help his current predicament. It was really starting to burn now, the fresh skin stretching in ways he would really prefer that it didn't. Harry closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. He willed himself to take deep breaths.

"Did you want me to help you put it on?" Draco had reappeared in front of him, holding the jar of ointment. Harry glared up at him.

"I'm think that might, in fact, make it worse," he said. "Don't you?"

"I hadn't thought of that."

"Clearly." He reached up and took the jar from Draco. "Do you mind?" He gestured towards the door. Draco's brow furrowed in confusion. "Could you, ah, step outside for a moment?" Harry clarified.

"Right. Yes." Draco turned what he assumed was beet red, but was instead faintly pink, and scurried out of the room. As soon as the door shut behind him, Harry gingerly unbuttoned his trousers. He took a deep breath and a muttered string of 'ow's under his breath. For some reason, acknowledging the pain that way seemed to help it feel a bit better.

He cursed everything from friction to hormones to Malfoy's bloody perfect arse as he gently eased his trousers down around his thighs and then breathed a sigh of relief as he began to slather the lotion on. The pain immediately melted away, and not for the first time Harry was glad that he was a wizard and that magic existed.

And it was at that moment, the moment that Harry began to rub ointment onto his dick, that Snape entered the room followed closely by a loudly protesting Draco Malfoy.

…

"Please tell me that you understood some of what Babbling was saying," Ron said as he entered his and Pansy's room. "Because I'm not sure I did. I mean, I wrote everything down, but I may have gotten slightly distracted when she said that we could possibly, accidentally blow up our cauldron and have to start from scratch."

"That was what distracted you?" Pansy asked, dropping her books down on the table with a thump. "I was more concerned about the fact that it could potentially change the potion in some small insidious way that we wouldn't understand until we tried it and got stuck in a vision until the antidote could be brewed."

"I mean, that was also a concern. But that's more of a future concern." Pansy pursed her lips but said nothing. Ron gnawed on his lower lip and peered down at his notes. They were barely legible, but in reading through them again, he began to grasp what they were supposed to do. He sighed. There was no way that they would be leaving early. Casting the rune properly required a lot of preparation, concentration, and teamwork. There were about fifteen different ways he could see that it would go wrong and he was sure there were at least fifteen other ways that he had not yet thought of. Pansy glanced over his shoulder and frowned.

"How can you even read that?" she asked.

"I have hidden talents."

"Handwriting is clearly not one of them."

"But reading bad handwriting is." She snorted with laughter, then reached up and covered her mouth, embarrassed. Ron did not notice.

"You should use a self writing quill," she said after a moment. Ron shrugged.

"I would, but then I don't learn anything. I'm a, whatchamacallit. I learn by writing things down." Pansy cocked her head to the side and looked at him thoughtfully.

"You could have it copy down notes at the same time as you write them," she suggested after a moment. Ron's eyes widened and he stared at her as if properly seeing her for the first time. She shrugged, uncomfortable at the sudden attention, and reached up to pull her dark hair up into a bun on top of her head.

Ron turned back to his notes, suddenly awkward. He put the awkwardness down to the silence of the room. He was itching, again, to fill that silence with chatter. He couldn't help it. He liked to talk, but he didn't know Pansy well enough to know what to talk about and it felt like most of their conversations had ended with her being annoyed at him or vice versa. He longed for the easy companionable chatter that he had with the Gryffindors - the chatter of good friends - and he silently cursed Snape again for pairing the two of them.

"So, are you going to the school Halloween Party?" Pansy asked. Ron looked up, startled.

"Uh, yes. Of course," he said. "Are you?" Pansy smirked.

"For a bit," she said.

"Only a bit?"

"Well, it's not the only party of the night."

"Oh, you mean Sir Nearly Headless Nick's Deathday party?" Pansy looked at him as though he had grown a second head.

"No," she said. "I was referring to the Annual Slytherin Halloween Party. One of _the_ best parties of the year. But then, I don't suppose anyone has invited you."

"Er, no," Ron said. "They haven't." He tried not to sound too put out about it. Pansy watched him cooly from behind her fringe. Ron shifted his weight from one foot to the other. The silence stretched and Ron fought the instinct to say something - anything - else.

"Would you like to come?" Pansy finally asked, the side of her mouth quirking into a smile.

"Um, ok, sure." Ron hoped he sounded nonchalant.

"Great," Pansy said. "I'll add you to the list." She grinned at him, her whole face breaking into a smile and Ron resisted the urge to do a small, happy dance.

…

"Right," Blaise said as he and Hermione entered their room. "This is going to be a challenge." He was all business and Hermione appreciated this about him. She could only imagine how Ron was getting along.

"Well, the rune part isn't _too_ difficult," she said.

"True," Blaise agreed. "It's not like we're casting Gar-g." He made a horrified face and Hermione laughed. She tried not to compare him to Ron in her head, but the thought that she could not joke about runes with Ron involuntarily crossed her mind. She sighed and pushed Ron from her thoughts. They had work to do.

"Thank heaven for small mercies," she said and then immediately regretted it. She was never sure how wizards felt about religion. It seemed to vary from person to person, the same way it did with her primary school friends, except that some of them were very, well, _particular_. But then, those same wizards often seemed particular about whether or not someone had been born to Muggle parents or not and it seemed that those wizards took more umbrage over the fact that Muggle-born witches and wizards did not automatically invoke Merlin or Morgana or some other famous wizard in their cursing. Blaise, however, did not seem to bat an eyelid.

"Indeed," he said, walking over to their cauldron and inspecting the potion inside of it. He knelt down next to the table and inspected the flame. Finding everything to his expectations, he straightened up and nodded to himself.

Hermione, meanwhile, began reading through her notes again. A small frown creased her brow and Blaise couldn't help but pause for a moment just to look at her. He was not a hundred percent sure what his feelings were towards her, the fact that she was a Gryffindor and muggle born certain muddied the waters, but there was growing affection, that was for sure. But he could not let it distract him right now, so he rolled his head from one side to the other, feeling the joints crack with the release of tension, and set to work gathering the ingredients they would need.

Then came that careful dance of partnership. Blaise held the ends of the sweet grass reeds and lemongrass while Hermione plaited them together. Then he folded the finished weave into the right shape while she held the loose ends, and then froze it in shape once it was complete. Blaise then held the framework for the Rune while Hermione wove the various other ingredients into it.

They did not talk much while they worked, only a word here or there to convey what needed to happen next or what they were doing, but it was a companionable silence. And time slipped away the way that it does when you work on something interesting with someone you enjoying spending time with. Before either of them really realized it, they were done.

Hermione looked up at Blaise, her face flushed from exertion and steam, and smiled.

"Easy as pie," he said, standing back from the cauldron.

"Are you discounting all the hard work we did?" Hermione asked, but he saw her bite back a smile and knew that she was kidding.

"Not in the slightest." He glanced down at his watch. "Huh, it appears we finished with time to spare."

"Oh," Hermione said. Blaise frowned as he caught a note of sadness in her voice.

"Are you not excited by the prospect of free time?" he asked. As soon as the question was out of his mouth, he realized that it was both blunt and intrusive. But it was out there. And it hung between them for a long, quiet moment while Hermione found the right words to describe her feelings.

"I am," she said slowly. "But I'm also not sure what to do with that time. I mean, no offense to Harry or Ron but I doubt they'll be done anytime soon."

"I see your point."

"And it's not as though I can't come up with things to do on my own."

"I would never suggest such a thing."

"But it's Friday and I'm tired and Ron usually supplies the conversation and the entertainment for the evening."

"I imagine he's quite good at that," Blaise said. For half a moment he was oddly jealous, but he let the feeling go. Hermione nodded absently. She began to pack up her things and he cast around wildly in his mind for something else to say. He didn't want her to leave yet, not while they were getting along so well. Houses be damned. He wanted to be her friend. Or perhaps more, said a part of him that he ignored.

"Would you, uh, want to play a board game or something?" he asked. Her hand paused halfway in the path from her bag to her pile of books.

"Sure," she said. He grinned.

…

"It's not what it looks like," Harry spluttered before Snape could say anything. He grabbed one of the cushions off of the sofa and held it over his lap, careful not to touch anything with it.

"Well I should bloody well hope it's not," Snape said. "That is _not_ what these rooms were designed for." He did not mention that these rooms had been used for years by sixth and seventh years looking for a quiet place to hook up without being caught. Nor did he mention how he knew that. (It wasn't creepy, he just checked the ward log ins.) He paused for a moment, then narrowed his eyes and stared at Harry. "If it's not what it looks like, what the bloody hell is it?"

"We had a fight," Draco interjected. "Yesterday. And Harry got hurt."

"Yes, I heard about that, but that doesn't explain why his trousers are around his knees."

"He got hurt in his trouser area," Draco said. Then he frowned at himself, irritated that his grasp of the English language seemed to have failed him.

"Draco, did I not teach you that real men fight above the belt?" Snape asked.

"I did it to myself," Harry said.

"What?" Snape spluttered. "Merlin, Potter, I knew you were stupid, but I didn't think you were so stupid as to do that." Not for the first time in the last forty eight hours, Harry wanted the floor to swallow him whole. This was most definitely not a conversation that he wanted to have with his least favorite teacher. The only way it could be worse would be if he were having the conversation with Trelawney.

"I didn't do it on purpose," Harry snapped. He glared at Snape with as much dignity as he could muster sitting on the couch with no trousers on.

"Well," Draco began to say, but a glare from Harry silenced him. "What?"

"Malfoy, shut up," Harry hissed.

"Enough." Snape crossed his arms and glared at them. "You," he pointed at Draco. "Tell me exactly what happened." Draco looked over at Harry, who gave a small shake of his head.

"Potter accidentally tried to curse his dick off," Draco said. Harry glared at Draco in such a way that he hope conveyed his feeling of intense anger. He ground his teeth.

"I didn't try to curse it off," he protested. "I was trying to clean it." Snape frowned at him.

"Clean it how?"

Harry took a deep breath. He did not know how to explain what happed without actually explaining what happened.

" _Fine_ ," he said finally, through clenched teeth. "Let's just embarrass Harry in front of everyone, shall we?" Draco shrugged.

"I don't see any issue with that," he said. Harry nearly threw the pillow at him, but as it was covering his nether regions, he kept a hold of it.

"I accidentally came in my pants and I was trying to surreptitiously clean it up." Comprehension dawned on Snape's face.

"Merlin, Potter, did none of your friends teach you the proper spells? I ought to take ten points from Gryffindor just for that. What did you use? Scourgify?" Harry nodded. "And I suppose Poppy gave you a cream for that." Harry nodded again. "That still does not explain why you are applying it here and now. Surely you could have used a restroom?"

"I couldn't get there in time," Harry mumbled. He realized they had managed to get to this point in the conversation without revealing to Snape that he and Draco were romantically involved, but it now seemed like they were about to get to the big revelation.

But Harry had not considered Draco's prodigious lying abilities.

"I accidentally kneed him in the crotch," Draco said.

"Which is why he had an erection?" Snape asked.

"Professor! I would prefer we not talk about my private parts this way!" Harry cried. He was absolutely mortified.

"Fine, you win," Draco said at almost the same time. "We're dating."

"I am unsure how I win in this scenario," Snape said. "Either way, I couldn't care less if you two were sleeping each other or not, so long as you do it on your own time. Right now, it is time for Potions and if you two want to be done before dinner time, I would highly recommend you stop dicking around and get to work."

"But," Harry started to splutter. He wanted to protest and say that they had not been trying to use lesson time in such a way, but in a way, they had.

"Silence," Snape hissed. "Enough talking. Get your trousers back on and get to work. You've wasted enough time as is." He swept out of the room and Harry wondered if he ever just walked out of rooms or if his robes always had to do that swishy thing.


	14. Chapter 14

Blaise and Hermione quickly ran into the issue of finding a house neutral place to play their board game. They had decided on Wizard's Chess as it was a game that both of them knew how to play (even if it wasn't Hermione's favorite), but after Blaise had fetched his set from the Slytherin Common room, they had just stood awkwardly in front of the blank stretch of wall that concealed its entrance.

"I've always found it strange," Hermione said after a minute of searching her mind for a place where they could go, and coming up blank. "That all of the common rooms have such different doors." Blaise cocked his head to the side and looked at her with interest.

"What makes you say that?" he asked. She shrugged.

"Oh, I don't know," she said. "Just something to do with the fact that we're standing outside of your common room and it is so different from mine. We have a portrait, which perhaps gives us away, particularly in comparison to this." She gestures to the wall. "How would you know where it was if you hadn't had someone to tell you?"

"I don't know which portrait your common room is behind," Blaise protested. "There are thousands of portraits in this castle."

"I suppose."

"Wait," Blaise said. "Something's coming back to me. It's a portrait of a fat lady. I have a vague recollection of someone saying that she was missing after that attack on the Gryffindor Common room in third year. But I don't know _which_ fat lady." Hermione laughed.

"I could show you," she said. "Of course, then I would have to swear you to secrecy."

"Would we be able to play chess in the Gryffindor Common room, do you think?" Blaise asked. Hermione thought about it for a moment and then shook her head.

"Should we just go back to our little pod then?"

"I suppose." She didn't really want to go back there, but they were rather short on options. Then inspiration hit. "What about the Room of Requirement?" Blaise slapped a hand to his forehead.

"Of course! I can't believe I didn't think of that. I'm such a ninny." Hermione giggled. She felt oddly light and she supposed it was the feeling that came with having no more responsibilities for the day while everyone else was still working. She liked the feeling, but she couldn't help thinking that being around Blaise had something to do with it.

She couldn't deny that they had some sort of chemistry. Thus far, they had worked remarkably well together with their potion. Although she could not see any of the others', she was almost certain their was among the best. And it did not hurt that he was devastatingly attractive, with his sharp cheekbones and milky coffee skin.

"So have you thought about your halloween costume yet?" Hermione asked as they started to make their way up the stairs. Her conversation with the Gryffindors this morning felt like it had taken place yesterday, though she realized it had only been that morning.

"Of course," Blaise said almost immediately. "Pansy wouldn't invite me to the Halloween party until I had a costume picked out."

"You're going to the party with Pansy?" Hermione asked. She was careful to keep her tone casual, but this was the first she had heard of Pansy and Blaise having any sort of relationship and she was surprised to find the idea painful.

"Ah, crap," Blaise said. "You probably don't know about the Slytherin Halloween party, do you?" Hermione frowned and shook her head. "Well, the cat's out of the bag now. Why don't you come as my plus one?" A thrill of excitement blossomed in the pit of Hermione's stomach.

"That would be lovely."

"Wonderful." They reached the marble staircase. It was quiet as most students were still in lessons. Hermione's stomach grumbled. She looked towards the Great Hall and noticed that there was a table still spread with food.

"By any chance, would you like to get some lunch?" she asked. She glanced down at her watch. "I know it's a little past lunch time, but it looks like the house elves have a table spread for stragglers."

"Lunch would be brilliant." He started quickly towards the Great Hall as if worried the food would suddenly disappear. "I was prepared to be starving until dinner, but this is clearly much preferable." Hermione laughed. They sat down at the end of the table and Blaise immediately began to pile food onto his plate in a way that reminded Hermione of Ron. She reflected, not for the first time, how different Blaise seemed to be when he was away from his peers. Gone was the aloof and pretentious Blaise that she had grown used to, and in his place was this interesting and thoughtful young man. She wondered how the Gryffindors must appear to other people.

"So tell me more about this party," she said. Blaise looked up, his mouth full of the sandwich he had just bitten into. He clapped a hand over his mouth, a guilty look in his eyes.

"Mmm srrreee," he mumbled, his mouth still somewhat full. Her mouth twisted in amusement. It was so far removed from the perfection he tried to exude most of the time that she found it oddly hilarious. She said nothing while he finished his mouthful. "I'm sorry," he clarified once he was done.

"Don't worry," she said. "People always seem to ask questions as soon as you can't answer them. Honestly, I think some waiters do it on purpose so that all you can say when they ask 'How is the meal?', is," she paused and covered her mouth. "Mmm, great." Blaise burst out laughing.

"I think you may be on to something," he said. "But, back to your original question. The Annual Slytherin Halloween party is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. After everyone has been at the school Halloween party for about an hour, we all sneak off to the Room of Requirement for the _real_ party."

"And by real party, I assume you mean something that as a prefect I would normally have to turn a blind eye to?"

"Possibly?" He grinned and his eyes sparkled. Hermione found herself blushing and she glanced down at her plate.

"I'll be there," she said. She looked up again and returned his smile which in the time it had taken her to glance down had gone from mischievous to shy. "It sounds like it will be a lot of fun."

"I can assure you that it will be," he said. "And if it's not, you may address all complaints to Pansy."

…

"Well, that could have gone better," Harry said after a long moment of silence. Draco sniggered.

"That's an understatement." He moved towards their desk and peered down at his notes. Harry sat immobilized on the sofa, still clutching the pillow over his lap. When it appeared as though Draco had forgotten he was there, Harry gave a small cough. Draco looked over at him.

"What?"

"Uh, I still need to put my trousers back on."

"So put your trousers back on." Draco began to read again.

"Erm, could you, perhaps, I don't know, stand in the corner or something? So that you can't see?"

"I can't really see you here."

"Please?"

With a sigh, Draco relented. He picked up the notes he was reading and took them over to the corder of the room. As soon as Harry was sure he was not looking, he put the pillow down and eased his trousers back on. In the surprise and embarrassment of Snape walking into the room, his erection had gone away - a fact for which he was grateful. He quickly re-buckled his belt and then made his way over to the table.

"Right then," he said. "Let's get cracking, shall we?"

"I'll try to keep the sexual tension to a minimum," Draco said with a smirk as he joined Harry at the table.

"I think if we just avoid making out, that should work."

"So I can still flirt with you?"

"Do you call knocking me over and sending all my papers flying flirting?"

"No, I called that covering up our covert affair."

"Covert affair? You make it sound like we're spies or something."

"We could be," Draco said. "I mean, we're sneaking around and being all secretive." Harry frowned at him. "OK, so we're not spies, and perhaps we're not really sneaking anywhere." He paused and then said, "Oh, Potter, you ruin everything." Harry shrugged.

"Would you like to sneak over to the storeroom and get the top secret ingredients of sweet grass and lemongrass while I look at how to weave them together?" he asked. "See if you can do it with no one spotting you." Draco's eyes lit up and he nodded excitedly. He had recently watched Mission: Impossible and wondered if he could come up with an excuse to hang down from the ceiling on a string.

"I'm on it," he said and he stole out of the room. Harry rolled his eyes at his retreating back.

But for some reason, the idea of pretending to be spies stuck and they spent the next few hours keeping up the charade. It made it feel less like work and more like a game, though, they both agreed that it was a very serious game. They were serious spies and this was a serious potion, so they had to get it perfect. Somewhere along the way they gave each other code names, and then began giving codenames to their friends, even though they weren't in the room.

"What about Beaver for Granger?" Draco asked. Harry, who was busy trying to weave snow drop flowers into their Rune, did not look up but shook his head. "Why not?"

"Well, one: it's a bit rude. And two: I know why you want to call her that, and I am pleased to inform you that her teeth are perfectly normal sized now. And really, that's all thanks to you."

"Oh?"

"Yes, after you hit her with that teeth growing curse in fourth year, she had Madame Pomfrey fix them."

"Oh. I hadn't noticed."

"Well, in all fairness, I didn't notice either." He frowned and wound the last flower into the rune.

"Capital job, Spaniel," Draco said. He set the rune gently down onto the table.

"Thank you, Blond Unicorn."

"I still feel like you're mocking me with that name. "

"Only a little bit." Harry smirked as Draco glared at him. "Oh, don't look at me like that."

"I'll look at you however I want to."

"How very assertive of you." At this, Draco winked.

"Did you want to have Professor Thistle check our Rune before we drop it in?" They had decided that since Snape could be quite a prickly fellow, this name suited him.

"That probably couldn't hurt," Harry said. Draco nodded. He raised his wrist to his mouth.

"Ten four. Copy that."

"Draco, you're not even wearing a watch," Harry pointed out. Draco waved his comment away and went to go get Snape. Harry paced the room while he was gone and stretched his arms over his head. His shoulders felt tight from the stress of holding his hands steady for so long. His stomach gurgled and he checked his watch, which he _was_ wearing, unlike Draco. It was gone two thirty, so he was not surprised that he felt hungry, though he was amazed at how quickly the time had gone.

"Right," Snape said as he entered the room. "Let's see what you've managed to produce." He swept over to the table and peered down at the Rune that was sitting there. After staring at it for a moment, he straightened up, crossed his arms and looked back and forth between Harry and Draco with suspicion. "Who helped you with this?" he asked after a long moment spent glaring at them.

"N-no one," Harry stammered. This was not how he had envisioned this conversation going. He hadn't really envisioned the conversation at all, to be honest. He had just thought Snape would come in, sneer at the Rune and tell them to get on with it.

"This is excellent work, and you are by far the most efficient pair today. Even in spite of your earlier mischief," he paused and watched with amusement as Harry's face flushed. "You are the second pair to finish your Rune." Snape unfolded his arms and his face softened. "Well done, Potter. Perhaps you're not a complete dolt after all."

"I helped," Draco piped up.

"Of course you did. But I would expect nothing short of good work from you, Draco. Perhaps you are rubbing off on him." _That's not the only rubbing Draco wants to do with you_ , came Seamus's voice in Harry's head.

Harry was glad that Snape could not hear his thoughts, but then froze when he remembered his Occlumency classes from the year before. He quickly thought about brick walls, just in case. Was he imagining it, or was Snape now scowling at him again? It was hard tell as Harry rarely saw Snape look at him with anything other than dislike. (That or he had resting bitch face - Harry wasn't sure.)

"So we can add this to our potion?" Harry asked.

"You may." Snape studied Harry's face for a moment, and Harry saw an emotion flit across his professor's features that he had never seen before. "Perhaps you do take after your mother after all." Then Snape seemed to snap out of whatever reverie he had been in with a small shake of his head. He nodded curtly at both Draco and Harry and then was gone in a billow of robes.

"What was that about?" Draco asked once he had left.

"I don't know." Harry was frowning at the door which had just closed behind the potions professor.

"Well, shall we add our Rune then?"

"Yes," Harry said. He nodded, more to himself than to Draco, and held out his hand. Draco took it and together they lifted up the Rune and lowered it slowly into the potion. The potion emitted a shower of lime green and neon pink sparks as the Rune sank down into the liquid.

"And now we stir fifty times counterclockwise," Draco said. He picked up a wooden spoon and began to stir. "Merlin, this seems like an awful lot."

"Quit complaining," Harry said. He playfully nudged Draco's hip with his own.

"Behave yourself, you cretin," Draco said, slapping Harry on the arm with his free hand. "I don't want to lose count." Harry rolled his eyes but knew that Draco was right, so he stepped away and began to clean up the detritus they had left behind on the table.

Once Draco had finished stirring, he stepped back from the cauldron and eyed the potion with pride.

"I can't believe we finished so early," he said.

"Great," Harry replied. "Can we get some food now?" As if to back him up, his stomach growled loudly. Draco snorted in amusement.

"Yes, fine," he said. "Come on." Harry scooped up his bag and followed the blond out the door. They were unsurprised to find the corridor deserted and Draco took the opportunity to not so subtly run his fingers over the back of Harry's hand. Harry glanced over at him and smiled.

"Potter," came a voice from behind them. Harry stopped walking as suddenly as if there had been an invisible wall in front of him. He whipped around to find Snape standing in the door to his office. "I would like to see you for a moment. Alone." Harry's heart sank. He was not sure how he had managed to irritate the potions professor this time. Snape probably wanted to ask him how they had cheated on their potion, which was not fair as they hadn't.

"I'll wait for you," Draco muttered. "Go." Harry squared his shoulders and then walked down the corridor and into Snape's room. As soon as he crossed the threshold, Snape shut the door.

"Sit," he said and Harry did, perching on the edge of the chair.

"I promise you, sir," he began but Snape waved his hand to silence him and Harry snapped his mouth shut. Snape lowered himself into his chair, opposite Harry.

"Potter," he said slowly. "You are not here to be punished." Harry's mouth made a small o. "Instead, I wanted to give you this." Snape reached into his desk drawer and drew out a small, unlabeled phial. Harry eyed it warily.

"Thank you, sir, but what is it?"

"It's for your, ahem, problem." Snape looked over Harry's shoulder at a spot on the wall behind him.

"Thank you?" Harry was unsure why Snape was helping him, or, in fact, whether Snape was actually trying to make it worse.

"It's an experimental lotion," Snape continued as though Harry had not said anything. "That I've been researching for the St. Mungo's burn unit."

"So I'm a guinea pig?" Harry asked.

"Of course not. We used real guinea pigs for that. Take it or leave it, Potter. I just figured it would help with your, ah, situation." Somehow Snape managed to draw out the word situation so that it sounded longer than its four syllables.

"But why, sir?"

"Why? Because I invented it and it has been called nothing short of miraculous. Obviously."

"I meant, why give it to me?" Snape sighed heavily and leaned back in his chair.

"Because, Potter," he said in a clipped tone. "I become sentimental around this time of year, and I think that your mother would have preferred you not suffer needlessly."

"Thank you, sir." Snape nodded once at him.

"You may leave now." Harry didn't need to be told twice.


	15. Chapter 15

"What was that all about?" Draco asked after Harry emerged from Snape's office. "You didn't get in trouble, did you?"

"Why would you immediately assume that I was going to get in trouble?"

"Because it's you." Harry crossed his arms and pouted. Draco rolled his eyes. "Fine, what was it about then, if you _weren't_ getting in trouble?" Harry looked around. The corridor was still deserted. He wasn't sure why he'd even bothered looking, but it was private business and he didn't want anyone overhearing. He pulled the phial out of his pocket and held it out to Draco.

"Snape gave me this," he said. Draco took the phial and examined it. After a minute of turning it over in his hands and examining it, he gave it back.

"What is it?"

"It's an experimental burn healing lotion. Or, I guess skin healing lotion. It's for this." He gestured down at his crotch. Draco grinned.

"That's great!" he cried. "Go and put it on." He pushed Harry in the direction of their pod.

"What, now?" Harry spluttered. "But what about lunch?"

"Lunch can wait," Draco said as they entered their private room. "We have some unfinished ravishing to attend to, and the faster you get better the faster we can continue that." Harry stared at him. "What? I'm a teenage boy with teenage hormones. Now get your trousers off." Harry looked at the ceiling in exasperation.

"If you want me to put it on, you need to leave," he said. "I'm don't want you looking at me in this condition."

"Fine, fine," Draco said. He threw his arms up in surrender. "I'll meet you outside, and then I promise you we can get some lunch." Harry nodded and watched as he left the room again. He unbuckled his trousers for the second time that day, feeling distinctly like this would have been better done in a bathroom. He felt so exposed in the empty room. The cauldron bubbled across the table from him and Harry wondered if Snape had any sort of surveillance charms in the room. He hoped not.

Once his trousers were around his knees, he opened the phial. There was very little liquid in there, so Harry assumed he only needed one application. He wished he'd had the presence of mind to ask, but there was no way he was going to go back to Snape's office to double check now. He tipped some of the lotion onto his hand and then slathered it onto his dick. The lotion tingled, but in a good way. It was the opposite feeling to yesterday when it felt like his crotch had been covered in fire ants. This felt, well, this felt _good_.

Harry tipped the rest of the balm onto his hand and worked it into all of the injured skin around his crotch. Unbidden, a sigh escaped his lips. He had not realized how much it had still been hurting even with Pomfrey's salve on, but as his skin began to absorb the lotion, he realized just how much better it felt now. Too late, Harry became conscious of the fact that it felt too good and that his problem from this morning had, for lack of a better word, sprung back into existence.

"Shit," he muttered. He looked down and his erection stared back at him. "I do not have time for this right now." He was just going to have to be uncomfortable until it inevitably went away again. He finished rubbing on the lotion and then pulled his trousers back up. He looked down again and tried to adjust his trousers in a way that made his arousal look less obvious. Shrugging, he swung his bag onto his shoulder and positioned it so that it hung somewhat across his front. Pocketing the now empty phial, he left the room.

…

Once they had finished eating, Hermione and Blaise decided it was easiest just to stay in the Great Hall for their game of chess. Hermione was curious as to who else might finish their rune work early and wanted to keep an eye on the staircase down to the dungeons, and once she had mentioned it, Blaise became interested in knowing that as well.

While he waited for her to make her next move in their chess game, he stared out into the Entrance Hall. Though Hermione had protested that she was no good at chess, Blaise was of the opinion that she protested too much and was in fact quite good. She had mentioned several times now that Ron was a much better player than she was and this intrigued Blaise. He had not thought that this particular Weasley was overly intelligent, but it appeared that he must be. Perhaps his mother was right when she said that everyone had hidden depths.

"Your move," Hermione said. Blaise turned his attention back to the game. He took in the pieces and sighed as he noticed that Hermione had put her bishop in a place where she could either take his king, or his knight. He moved the king and winced as she delightedly took his knight. The little man limped off the board, leading his horse dejectedly by the nose.

"Sorry," she said.

"Why are you sorry?" he asked.

"He looks so sad."

"That's just how wizard's chess goes."

"I know," she said with a sigh. "It's one of the reasons I don't like it very much. The muggle version is much less violent. I mean, the moves are all the same, but the pieces aren't nearly so lifelike and they don't make you feel bad for them."

"I can see how that might be preferable," Blaise said. "It takes out the emotional burden and leaves you with just the logic part of the game."

"I suppose you could think of it that way," Hermione mused. She watched as Blaise thought about his next move, idly twisting a strand of hair around her finger.

"…great news," said a voice, drifting in from the Entrance Hall. They both turned to look and were greeted by the sight of Harry and Draco having a rather animated, and, Hermione thought, friendly, conversation. If she had not known already that they were friends, she would have begun to guess it now. She glanced at Blaise, unsure if she knew about the pair of them or not. From the small furrow in his brow, she guessed that he did not.

They stopped walking when they spotted the open door to the Great Hall and had a more subdued conversation that neither Hermione nor Blaise could hear. As they watched, the pair seemed to come to a decision. Blaise raised a hand in greeting as Harry and Draco began to walk towards them. Harry was walking faster than Draco and looked delighted about the fact that there was still food to be had.

"Hi, Hermione," he said, beaming at her.

"Hi." He sat down next to her and Draco took the seat next to Blaise, who was still frowning at the two of them.

"Zabini," Harry said, nodding at Blaise. Blaise seemed to snap back to attention at the sound of his name and he managed to flash Harry a small smile. Harry, oblivious to this, began to pile food onto his plate.

"You're finished early," Hermione said. She picked up one of her discarded pawns and twirled it in her fingers.

"I suppose we are," Draco said. He glanced nervously at Blaise. "I mean, why would we want to spend more time with each other than we absolutely had to?" The frown appeared back on Blaise's face and Draco busied himself with a bowl of soup.

"I'm not surprised that you two were first," Harry said. "You're both such clever bootses." Draco snorted in amusement, which he quickly covered with a cough. Blaise's frown deepened.

"We're what?" he asked.

"Clever bootses." Harry twisted his face in irritation. "That's not quite right. But I don't know what the plural for clever boots would be."

"Clever boots?" Blaise asked.

"I think it must be a Muggle phrase," Hermione explained.

"He's too polite to say you're both swots," Draco said.

"Thanks, Malfoy," Harry said, sarcasm dripping from his tone. Draco shrugged.

"What? I said you were polite." He rolled his eyes and went back to eating his soup. Blaise spent a moment looking from Harry to Draco and back again, the frown still evident on his face. After a long moment, he said,

"So are you two friends now?" Harry looked up gormlessly and it was all Hermione could do not to laugh at his facial expression.

"Uh," Harry said.

"Yes," Draco cut in over him. Blaise nodded slowly.

"Well that's new," he said. He turned to Hermione. "Did you know?"

"I had an inkling."

"Well, in which case, Potter, you should also come to the Slytherin Halloween Party!" His face broke into a grin. "I've already invited Hermione. She's coming as my plus one." Draco turned to look at him.

"Have you told Pansy?" he asked.

"Not yet, but I will." Draco nodded slowly. He turned back to Harry.

"Yes, Harry, you should come."

"Alright," Harry said. "When is it?"

"On Halloween," Blaise said.

"Duh," Draco added. "Merlin, you're thick sometimes, Potter." Harry stuck his tongue out at the blond and Hermione rolled her eyes at the pair of them. She wondered how long it was going to take before the entire school caught on to the fact that they were not only friends, but an item. The way they were acting, it would not be long. She just hoped their relationship wouldn't leak to the press or the outside world at all. She couldn't imagine that it would go well if it did.

"I will ask Pansy to add you both to the list," Blaise said. He picked up his bishop and took Hermione's rook with it. She flinched as the tiny man whacked the castle with his crozier until it turned into a small pile of rubble which then rolled slowly off of the board.

"Do you think she might allow Ron to come to the party?" she asked. If Blaise was a tad put out by this question, he did not show it.

"I'm sure she can be talked into it," he said.

"Good," Harry interjected. "Because we're doing a joint costume and mine won't really make sense without him."

"You're doing a joint costume with the Weasel?" Draco asked. He did _not_ manage to disguise his disappointment.

"Yes. That's what you do with your best friend."

"Fine. Blaise, do a joint costume with me."

"You would count me as your best friend?"

"One of them, yes." Blaise looked unconvinced.

"Oh, that's nice of you, but no can do, boss."

"I'm not your boss," Draco said, perhaps too quickly. Harry coughed to cover his snort of laughter.

"It's an expression, Draco. But, the point being, I already have a costume picked out." Draco pouted. He couldn't believe no one wanted to dress up with _him_.

"Granger?" he hazarded. "How about you?" Hermione's eyebrows shot up in surprise.

"Oh," she said softly. "I'm afraid I can't either. Seamus and I are going as a pair."

"Seamus?" Blaise asked. "You're dating Seamus?" He tried his best to keep the alarm out of his tone. To his astonishment, it was Harry who laughed loudest at this suggestion.

"Oh, lord no," Hermione said. "Not my type."

"But you should definitely invite him to the party," Harry said. "He's great fun at parties."

"So we've heard," said Blaise drily.

"Rumors only, of course," Draco added.

"Yes, well, they're probably all true," Hermione said. She moved her queen to a square where it was threatening Blaises's king. "Check." Blaise threw his arms up in defeat. "No, I haven't won yet!"

"I fold," he said.

"Wrong game."

"I still fold. You win. I don't want to go through the agonizing process of slowly losing properly."

"Poker then?" Draco asked. He had been inspired by Blaise's comment of folding. He looked around at the three of them. It was a trio of people that just a week ago he was not sure he would have imagined himself spending time with, not counting Blaise. Granted, he still wasn't sold on Granger, but he would put up with her for Harry's sake.

"Sure," Harry said. Blaise and Hermione both nodded their assent.

"Wonderful," Draco said. He reached into his bag and produced a pack of cards. "More people I can take money from." But he winked to let them all know that he was joking. Mostly.

* * *

Feedback, as always, is appreciated. :)


	16. Chapter 16

Harry probably should have guessed, but as it turned out, Draco had an incredible poker face. No matter how much he scrutinized the blond's features, the other man didn't give a single thing away. Harry figured his own poker face was passable as only Hermione seemed to be able to tell what he was thinking, but he knew it would only be a matter of time before Draco learned his tells. Perhaps he would tell Harry what they were so that he could work on disguising them.

For half a second, Harry wondered if Malfoy could help him with his Occlumency, since he had failed so miserably with Snape as a teacher. But then he realized that might involve Draco delving into his mind and learning things about Harry that Harry might not want to share. At least not yet. Not to mention, there was nothing that actually told him that Draco even knew Occlumency.

"I fold," Harry said, putting his cards down. They had been less than nothing, not even a pair. In fact, they were so bad, he almost wondered if someone was cheating, but as his hand before had been okay bordering on good, he did not actually think that was the case.

In the time that they have been playing, many of the other students from their class have filed up the stairs, looking tired but generally pleased with themselves. Most people have stopped by to grab sandwiches and a few had stayed to watch their match, including Seamus and Neville.

Harry watched while Hermione raised and both Blaise and Draco decided to call her on it. Blaise won the round with triple aces, much to Draco's displeasure.

"I think I am all pokered out," Hermione said, pushing away her hand.

"But," Draco began to protest.

"But you've only won five galleons?" Harry asked. His tone was dripping with sarcasm but he was worried that Malfoy would not pick up on it. The blond did, and stuck his tongue out at Harry.

"That's not what I meant."

"Sure it wasn't," Blaise said, scooping up his wins. "Maybe another time. I, personally, am going to quit while I am still behind, though not as behind as I was a few minutes ago."

"I'll play," Seamus said. Hermione stood up from her seat and he swooped in to take it.

"Yeah, alright," Draco said. "Anyone else?" He looked over at Neville who shook his head quickly.

"What's going on here?" asked Ron. Harry whipped around to see Ron and Pansy making their way slowly into the Great Hall. Ron looked as though he had just gone through ten rounds of Keeper training and Pansy's bun was all but falling out of its hair band.

"Poker," cried Draco happily. "Care to lose some money from me, Weasley? Do you even have any to spare? Ow." Harry had kicked him under the table.

"Can I eat while I play?" Ron asked.

"Please do," Harry said. "I believe that is what the food is here for." And so Draco found himself playing cards with three Gryffindors, and instead of hating it, he enjoyed himself. He quickly learned that he had no idea what anyone's poker tells were, but that clearly Ron did. The game soon devolved into a competition between the two of them with Draco winning one hand and then Ron winning the next.

After about an hour and a half, Harry put his cards down in defeat. By this point it was almost dinner time, and the food had long disappeared from the table. They were the only ones in the Great Hall now, as people had grown bored of watching them play. Glancing at his watch, Harry knew it was only a matter of time before the rest of the school would be joining them. He mentioned this to the group.

"Is it?" Draco asked. Harry nodded.

"It's about half past six," he said.

"Crap, I'm missing the dinner pre-game."

"The what?" Seamus asked

"Nothing. I need to go." Draco stood and made to leave.

"I think you said pre-game," Seamus said.

"I said no such thing."

"Yes, you did," Ron said. "I heard you." Draco scrunched up his face in a grimace, which all but gave away that they had heard him correctly.

"Can we come?" Seamus asked.

"No, of course not. It's a Slytherin thing."

"Ah, Slytherins being Slytherins," Seamus muttered to Harry.

"Those dicks," Harry muttered back.

"I beg your pardon, Potter," Draco said in outrage. "What did you say?" Harry smirked at him.

"Nothing," he said sweetly. Draco crossed his arms and tapped his foot on the floor, but Harry just continued to smile. He scowled and then turned to look at Seamus and Ron.

"So you're saying that you three would want to come to the Slytherin Common Room and hang out with the rest of the Slytherins?" Harry, Ron and Seamus looked back and forth between each other.

"No?" Ron said eventually, but he sounded unsure. "Maybe?" His afternoon with Pansy, while trying at times, had not been entirely unpleasant. They had found some common ground talking about baking of all things. And the poker game had been enjoyable. Draco had even apologized (kind of) for the whole Weasley is our King incident from the year before.

"Shall I ask Blaise if he thinks it's a good idea?" Draco asked. Seamus's mouth quirked sideways while he thought about this.

"Can't hurt," he said after a moment's contemplation.

"We should probably ask Hermione if she would want to join," Harry said. Ron turned pale and quickly shook his head.

"She would probably shut the whole thing down," he hissed. Seamus clapped a hand on Ron's shoulder.

"Give her a chance," he said. "I think you might be under the impression that Hermione's more uptight than she actually is."

"But Seamus," Ron protested. "She _loves_ rules."

"This is true," Harry said. "But she does also enjoy having a good time."

"Where is Hermione, anyway?" Seamus asked. He looked around the deserted Great Hall as if Hermione were just hiding under one of the tables.

"She mentioned something about taking the opportunity to have a nice long bath," Draco said. The three Gryffindors gaped at him. "What? Weren't any of you paying attention when she left?" Draco shook his head at them. "And you call yourselves her friends."

"So you'll ask Blaise," Harry prompted, getting the conversation back on track.

"Yes. You go find Granger and either bring her along or tie her up so she can't report us and meet me by the entrance to the Slytherin Common room." He began to walk away but then turned back. "You do know where that is, don't you?"

"Vaguely," Harry said, waving him away. "It's a wall, somewhere. We'll just wander the dungeons until we find you." Draco rolled his eyes.

"Take the first right and then the second left, Spaniel."

"Thanks, Blond Unicorn." Draco smirked and walked away, leaving Ron and Seamus to stare at Harry in confusion.

It was Ron who broke the silence.

"You two have ridiculous nicknames for each other?" he asked.

"No."

"Spaniel?" Harry blushed.

"We have ridiculous nicknames for everyone," he explained. He scooped up his bag and began to walk out of the Great Hall. Ron and Seamus followed and Harry began to tell them about the afternoon of pretending to be spies.

"So let me get this straight," Ron said once he had finished. "You thought _Creamsicle_ was a good name for me?"

"It was orange."

"Lovely. What's Hermione's?"

"We never quite figured it out. Malfoy wanted to call her Beaver and I vetoed it."

"What was mine?" Seamus asked. He had an excited gleam in his eyes.

"Hugh Grant." Ron failed to hide a snort of amusement.

"But I haven't had sex in a car with a prostitute," Seamus protested.

"No, but you _have_ had your fair share of indecent exposure incidents," Harry said. Seamus's shoulders slumped.

"Fair," he said after a moment. He looked up and grinned. "And I can't say they weren't fun."

…

They found Hermione in the common room, reading a book. She was so engrossed in it that she did not look up until Ron put a hand on her shoulder. Then she gave a start and looked around, noticing them for the first time.

"Oh, hello," she said. "Finished your poker game?"

"I won," Ron said.

"Kind of," Harry added.

"Mostly." Harry shrugged, conceding the point.

"Well done." She reached over and picked her bookmark up and tucked it safely in her book. Then she stretched, raising her hands above her head. The book almost fell off of her lap, but she quickly swooped down an arm and saved it. "Is it dinner time?"

"Almost," Seamus said. "But first, we were wondering-" Ron cut him off.

"-But first we had a very important question."

"Oh?"

"So, you know how you're a prefect," Ron said.

"Yes, as are you," Hermione pointed out. Ron flushed.

"So, you know how you're a better prefect than me?" Hermione smirked at him in amusement.

"Go on," she said.

"So, we were invited to partake in some illicit activities with the Slytherins."

"How illicit are we talking?"

"Some drinking. Possibly somewhat underage."

"Mm, so you're saying you're unsure how you should react as as it's not a private residence," Hermione said.

"What does a private residence have to do with anything?" Harry asked, genuinely curious. He was sure Hermione knew something that they didn't, as per usual.

"Well, I assume you were referring to the public drinking age of eighteen."

"It's seventeen for wizards," Ron said quickly. He was only a few months off of this and March could not come soon enough.

"Yes, well, I'm not sure how the law works for wizards, but I do know that if you're in a private muggle dwelling, you only have to be five." For the second time that day, Ron, Seamus and Harry all gaped at someone in unison. Ron was the first to recover.

"So you're saying you wouldn't report-" he began to say. Hermione frowned and crossed her arms.

"-Why do you always make it sound like I don't also enjoying having fun?"

"But you like rules," Ron protested feebly.

"Yes, Ronald. And I've also broken plenty of them in my time here. How many times have we snuck out to see Hagrid after curfew? Or has Harry snuck out to Hogsmeade? Or has Seamus put fire-whisky in all of our mornings' pumpkin juices?"

"Uh."

"Where is this party taking place?"

"We'll only tell you if you don't report it," Seamus said. Hermione stood up and whacked him on the back of the head with her book.

"Stop being dense," she said.

"Yeah," Harry said, proud of himself that he hadn't said anything to upset Hermione. "Hermione is totally cool with perhaps underage, but perhaps not depending on how the Slytherin common room is zoned, drinking."

"Way to give it away, Har'," Seamus said.

"The Slytherins have invited us to another party?" she asked. Seamus perked up.

" _Another_ party?" he asked. "This is the only party I know about." Hermione turned to Harry and Ron.

"Did no one invite him to the Halloween Party?" They looked at each other, then looked back at Hermione and shrugged. "Well, then that settles it. We must go and join them now, even if it's just to ensure that Seamus gets an invite to what I have been told is the party of the year."

"Really?" Ron asked. He tried to keep the disbelief out of his tone.

"Really," Hermione said. "Let me just put my book away." She hurried off and Ron turned to Harry.

"What has gotten into her?" he asked. Harry rolled his eyes.

"Oh Creamsicle, she's always-" he started to say but then stopped when Ron glared at him.

"I demand a new code name."

"Fine."

"Me too," Seamus piped up.

"No," Harry said. "We worked too damn hard on your nickname, Seamus."

"I'm honored?"

"How about Conan," Ron continued, ignoring both Harry and Seamus.

"What, like the American late night show host?"

"Who? No. I meant Conan the Barbarian."

"How are you Conan the Barbarian?"

"I dunno."

"At least the talk show host makes sense. He's got red hair."

"So that's a yes?"

"I'll ask Blond Unicorn."

"Who or what is Blond Unicorn?" Hermione asked, rejoining them.

"Oh, that's Malfoy," Ron said casually. He liked the nicknames now that he was in on them and had picked a better one.

As they walked back down to the dungeons, Harry filled Hermione in on their spy nicknames. He was pleased when she tried to hide her snort of laughter about Seamus's name. It meant they had picked a good one.

"So I don't have one?" she asked as they crossed the Entrance Hall.

"Well, Draco wanted to call you Beaver," Harry said. They moved to walk single file as they made their way down the stairs to the dungeons, Hermione in the lead.

"You did tell him I'd had my teeth fixed, right?"

"Of course." She nodded, satisfied.

"Well, I'm sure we can come up with something."

"What are we even going to do with these names?" Ron asked as they walked down the corridor.

"We'll pretend to be spies," Harry said. He was unsure how that would work or what that would entail, but that part would come later. Perhaps. Or perhaps they would just have silly nicknames for each other and call it a day. They took the first right as instructed and then the second left and were met with an empty corridor. Ron, clearly taking the cue that they were pretending to be spies, flattened himself against the wall hiding the door to the common room and put an ear to it. Hermione stifled a giggle.

"I'm not hearing anything," Ron said. And then the wall slid sideways and Ron fell over.

"Welcome to the weekend," Blaise cried. He was holding a tray of full shot glasses above his head and as they made their way into the room, he brought it down and handed them each a shot. Ron picked himself up off the floor with as much dignity as he could muster and followed them in.

Once all the Gryffindors had a shot glass in hand, Pansy and Draco joined them, each with their own measure of alcohol.

"Cheers," Draco said. He held his shot glass out and they all clinked glasses.

"Kanpai," Pansy said.

"Prost," added Blaise.

"Sláinte," Seamus joined in. When no one else added any more languages, Draco gave a small nod and they each threw back their shots. As they did, the common room filled with cheers. Harry wondered if it had been a test. Knowing the Slytherins, it probably had been. But seemingly they had passed because music filled the room and all of the upper years went back to whatever it was they had been doing before the Gryffindors had arrived. Welcome to the weekend indeed.

* * *

As ever, feedback is appreciated. :)


	17. Chapter 17

"Hi," Draco said, sidling up to Harry.

"Do you do this every weekend?" Harry asked.

"Most weekends. Unless there's Quidditch the next day. Or exams or something. I mean, this is the first year we've been allowed to join in. It's only for the sixth and seventh years." He gestured around the room at the lower years who were, for the most part, enviously watching them.

"Seems fun."

"It is, though we were a bit late to the party today. We're going to have to go in a minute." Draco pointed to the clock on the wall, which showed they had roughly fifteen minutes until dinner.

"Well, that's what you get for cheating my friends out of money," Harry said.

"I did no such thing," Draco protested. "In regards to cheating at least." He smirked and Harry nudged him playfully on the shoulder.

"Speaking of my friends, can we bring Seamus to the Halloween Party?"

"Yes," Seamus said, butting into the conversation. "Everyone says it's the event of the year." Somehow he had gotten his hands on a pint of what looked like beer. Harry gestured at it and Draco rolled his eyes but led Harry over to a corner of the room where Crabbe was manning a keg.

"Fine, Grant," Draco said, accepting a beer from Crabbe and handing it to Harry. "You can come."

"Score," Seamus said, pumping his fist in victory.

"But you'd better behave."

"Oh leave him alone, Draco," Pansy said, walking up behind him and wrapping her arms around his shoulders. "I was going to invite him anyway."

"You were?" Seamus asked. She shrugged.

"Ron suggested it."

"I knew I liked him."

"And yes, Potter, you can come too," she added before Harry could say anything. "This idiot already requested you as his plus one for reasons that are beyond me but that I honestly couldn't care less about." She untangled herself from Draco and instead walked over to Blaise and rested a head on his shoulder. Harry saw Hermione stiffen until Blaise shrugged and dislodged Pansy.

"She's a dear," Draco said, looking fondly in Pansy's direction. Harry wasn't sure what to say, so he just took a large sip of his beer instead. He could not say that it wasn't strange to be spending time in the Slytherin Common Room, but somehow it was much more relaxed than he would have anticipated. He had half expected more students to be staring at them, but most people seemed content to keep to themselves.

"Hey Malfoy," Seamus said. "I know I turned you down for a duo costume earlier, but it just occurred to me that you could join Hermione and I in our costume. As part of a group."

"But you won't want to," Harry said. "Once you find out what the costume is."

"And how would you know, Potter?" Draco asked in mock outrage.

"Because he's going to ask you to dress up as Dr. Evil and be bald."

"And why wouldn't I do that?" Harry shrugged. _He_ wasn't going to point out that Draco was the most vain person he had ever met.

"No one else offered," he said into his beer. But Seamus was already talking over him.

"So you'll do it?" he asked. His eyes were alight with excitement.

"Only if I get to have the bald cat," Draco said.

"I don't care if you have a cat or not," said Seamus.

"Alright then," Draco said. He looked over at Harry as he shook Seamus's hand as if to prove just how much Harry had been wrong. Harry smiled blithely back at him.

"So does this party continue after dinner?" Harry asked, changing the topic.

"What do you think?"

"Well, Friday night is the time people generally have more fun in the Gryffindor common room," Harry said. "So I guess yes?"

"Granger lets you lot have fun?" Draco asked. Harry scowled gently tapped Draco's shoe with his own with a small kick. "I jest."

"Well, she lets us have Honeydukes," Seamus said. Harry scowled and kicked him next.

"Seamus often spikes our pumpkin juice while Hermione pretends not to notice."

"Even when I spike hers," Seamus added.

"It's perfectly legal if you're in a private residence," Hermione said, bustling her way into the conversation. She turned to Harry and Seamus. "Stop trying to make it sound like I don't know how to have fun. We just have to keep the younger years in the dark about it all. Something that I see the Slytherins do not bother with." Draco shrugged.

"Eh," he said. "Gives them something to look forward to."

"Makes NEWT years seem less terrible," Blaise added, also sliding his way into the conversation. "I would like to point out that Slytherin has a better NEWT retention rate than Gryffindor."

"Yes, well, Fred and George really skewed our numbers," Hermione said, pursing her lips. "All of _our_ year came back."

"But back to my main point," Harry said. The alcohol in his system was making it abundantly clear to his brain that he didn't want to go back to the Gryffindor Tower without Draco after dinner. "The party continues?"

"Usually, but with the Halloween Party on Thursday, I doubt there will be much going on tonight." Harry tried not to let his disappointment show in his face.

With the weekend coming up, he was not sure when he would see Draco next. Of course he would see him on Monday morning in Double Potions, but he didn't want to wait that long. Nor did he want to roam the corridors hoping to randomly bump into the blond. And he didn't have Seamus's confidence so he didn't think he could just waltz into the Slytherin Common room. Draco's friends didn't even know they were dating. For all the Slytherins knew, Harry and Draco were barely friends.

"Are you saying you won't have the supplies?" Seamus asked. "Because I assure you that I can help out on that front." He winked at no one in particular.

"And the Room of Requirement can be whatever you want it to be," Harry said. "So we won't mess up any party planning as it will just turn into a different room." He looked around and noticed that everyone was staring at him. "What? It's been a long week. I want to relax. And I would like to do it, with all of you." He extended his arms wide to encompass the entire group.

"Even though we're Slytherins?" Blaise asked.

"Yes," Harry said decisively.

"To school unity," Seamus cried, lifting his beer glass up for a toast. No one joined him.

"To having a good time," Harry countered, raising his own glass. Blaise, Hermione and Draco clinked their glasses against his while Seamus gave him a goodnatured glare.

"To dinner," Blaise said, pointing at the clock. Several of the younger Slytherins had already started to vacate the common room, so they finished their drinks (some had more to finish than others) and filed out into the corridor.

"Meet at the Room of Requirement at nine?" Harry asked Draco as they made their way out of the dungeons.

"I think we can make that work," Draco said with a smirk. "Anything for the Boy Who Lived."

"Get stuffed."

They spent all of dinner catching each other's eye and smiling, a fact that did not slip past Blaise.

…

Nine o'clock rolled around sooner than Harry had anticipated. He realized around eight thirty that he was still in his school uniform and he wasn't sure that it would be overly cool to go to a party dressed this way. He looked around at his fellow Gryffindors and noticed that they were all in their street clothes. Hermione even looked slightly dressed up and Ron had taken the time to run a comb through his hair. When had that happened?

Seamus had enthusiastically told Neville and Dean about the party, and while Neville had needed some talking into it, they were both going as well. Dean had then invited Lavender and Parvati and so all of the Gryffindor Sixth years were going to come along. Just as soon as Harry got dressed.

He sighed and trudged up to the Boys' Dormitory, pulling off his jumper as he did. He pulled off his tie and tossed it, and the jumper, onto his bed. Then he took stock of himself in the mirror. He wondered if he could get away with just wearing this shirt and trousers. It almost looked like it wasn't part of a uniform? Except that everyone would know at a glance that that was what it was. He bent over his trunk and rifled through his clothes.

Eventually he settled on one of Dudley's less unattractive shirts and a pair of jeans. Standing back in front of the mirror, he decided the shirt almost fit him. It would have to do though, as he didn't really have much else. He'd never really needed any attractive clothing before and he'd already worn his good sweater on Tuesday for their Hogsmeade date, which meant he couldn't wear it again. Perhaps he could pick something up from the village this weekend when he and Ron inevitably went costume shopping there.

He put a hand up to his head and tried to flatten his hair down, to no avail. Then he took his glasses off and put them on his bedside table. He squinted at the mirror, everything much fuzzier than it had been a few seconds ago. On second thoughts, while he thought he looked better, he wasn't sure he could stand not being able to see distance all night, so he put the glasses back on. Shrugging at his reflection, he left the room and walked back down to join the others.

Seamus was standing by the portrait hole. He was holding a satchel that clinked suspiciously every time that he moved. Harry grinned at him.

"Shall we?" he asked.

"Let's."

When they reached the Room of Requirement, they found that the Slytherins had beaten them there. There was a door already set into the stone wall, with a sign on it instructing them to "Come in, losers". Harry raised his hand to knock before stopping himself and just turning the door handle.

"Oh good," came Draco's lazy drawl from inside the room. "The booze is here." The Gryffindors filed in and looked around.

The room had been transformed into a dark club, replete with upholstered booths, a bar (currently empty) and a dance floor. Music thumped quietly in the background.

"Wow," Harry said before he could stop himself. Behind him, Seamus whistled.

"How many people are you expecting?" He asked, walking over to the bar and plonking his bag down on top of it. Pansy shrugged and extricated herself from the booth the Slytherins were sitting in.

"This was the room, not my imagination," she said. She joined Seamus at the bar and helped him unload his bag, raising her eyebrows appreciatively when she realized that it had an undetectable extension charm on it. "How many people were _you_ expecting, Finnigan?" Seamus shrugged.

"It's always good to be prepared," he said.

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As ever, feedback is appreciated. :)


	18. Chapter 18

Later in the evening, the party was in full swing. Parvati had invited her sister, who invited some of her fellow Ravenclaws, one of whom had invited Ernie MacMillen who had brought some Hufflepuffs along. And thus, almost the entirety of the sixth year were gathered in the Room of Requirement, few to none of them completely sober. Seamus had been right to bring his entire larder of liquor.

Hermione found herself tending bar with Blaise and Pansy, marveling at the fact that she was voluntarily spending time with Pansy Parkinson. Pansy and Blaise were keeping up a steady stream of commentary on a variety topics, not least of all was what the sundry members of the school were getting up to in their different parts of the room. Hermione had been tuning in and out of their conversation, depending on what interested her.

"Were you aware of the fact that Justin Finch Fletchley and Seamus Finnegan have an on again off again somewhat relationship?" Pansy asked. The two in question were sitting on one of the sofas that were scattered about the room, Seamus with his arm around Justin's shoulder. Their faces were very close together.

"I think everyone knows that, Pans," Blaise said.

"Ok, so it's common knowledge," Pansy groused. She looked disappointed that she had not been the first to know. Then she shrugged and turned her gaze elsewhere.

"I'm starting to think Draco might be making friends with Potter," Blaise said. Hermione straightened up with a start, suddenly acutely aware of the conversation.

"Starting to think?" Pansy asked. "Please, are you blind? I think there's something more than friendship going on between them."

"More?"

"Yes, more," Pansy snapped.

"As in?"

"As in, do I think they're secretly fucking? Yes." Pansy suddenly seemed to remember that Hermione was on the other side of Blaise and looked uncomfortably over at her. Blaise's mouth had fallen open into a small o and Hermione was doing her best to keep a straight face as she stared back at the both of them. _She_ wasn't going to be the one that gave Harry and Draco's secret away, although she was unsurprised that other people were starting to notice that there was something between them. They were being remarkably sloppy at keeping it under wraps. Someone really needed to teach Harry that the best way to convince the school that they were still enemies was _not_ to make googly eyes at Draco from across the Great Hall.

"What do you think, Granger?" Pansy asked. She glanced over at Harry and Draco who were sitting in a booth in a dark corner of the room. "Are they friends? Or what?" Hermione shrugged.

"There's certainly been a thawing," she said careful. Pansy snorted.

"How diplomatic of you. How much do you want to bet something happens between them before the end of the year?" The Slytherin girl asked. "I'd wager ten galleons they at least make out before Christmas." Hermione fought to keep her face impassive.

"I bet it's before Halloween," she said, failing to keep a small smile off of her face.

"Do you know something we don't know?" Blaise asked, grabbing her arm and looking intently at her. Hermione flushed. She shook her head, not daring to speak for fear that her voice might give something away. Blaise let his hand drop. He turned back to Pansy.

"What about their fight the other day?" he asked. Pansy shrugged.

"Bump in the road," she said. "Look at them now." The three of them leaned over the front of the bar to ogle at Harry and Draco, but the pair didn't notice them. They were too wrapped up in whatever it was they were talking about. Pansy leaned back again and shrugged.

"Perhaps you're right," she said to Hermione. "I mean, there's clearly something there, but then, I think there's perhaps been something there on Draco's side for a while now." Now it was Hermione's turn to look surprised.

"Are you saying you know something I don't know?" she asked. Pansy shrugged again.

"Oh, just the odd lingering glance here or there," she said. "It could be nothing. At first I thought he was just staring at Potter in irritation, but the venom just wasn't there." She glanced back at them again and then turned her attention to the bar, running her hand over the bottles in front of her. She stopped at a bottle of Maker's Mark. She picked it up and held it out to Blaise.

"Shots?" she asked, cocking her head to the side.

"Why not?" he responded, glancing at Hermione for confirmation. She smiled and gave a small nod. "Half shot for Granger."

"What?"

"You seemed unsure and I didn't want to pressure you."

"In which case, a full shot for me, please," Hermione said. "I wasn't uncertain. I nodded yes."

"Honestly, Blaise," Pansy chided. "She's just shy, you muppet." Hermione was not sure this made it better, but she didn't press the issue. Instead she took the shot that Pansy handed her and raised it to toast the pair of them. They clinked glasses and she sipped down half of the measure. She swallowed quickly and finished it, blushing at Pansy's stare.

"I'm no good at shots," she muttered. Pansy shrugged.

"Doesn't make any difference to me," she said. "You finished it unlike this guy here." She turned her gaze to Blaise who was guiltily holding his glass out, half of the liquid still in it. He grinned sheepishly.

"I have other skills," he said. "It's just that taking shots is not one of them." Pansy reached up and patted him good-naturedly on the shoulder. At that moment, the song changed and Hermione watched as excitement crossed Pansy's face.

"I love this song," she cried, grabbing Blaise's free hand. "Let's dance!" He quickly finished the last of his alcohol and then she dragged him around the side of the bar. He looked over his shoulder at Hermione as he left, mouthing 'sorry' to her even as Pansy yanked him away.

Hermione stood for a moment, chewing her lip. She watched as Pansy threw her hands over Blaise's shoulders and began to move her hips gently against him. A bubble of irritation grew in her chest. She tried to push it away, but it stayed there, stubborn and growing with every passing minute. Other people joined them on the dance floor - seemingly buoyed by the fact that someone else had started dancing first. She spotted Ron standing awkwardly to the side of the room and walked over to him.

"Care to dance?" she asked. He looked at her in surprise.

"Who me?"

"Yes, you." She nudged him playfully with her elbow. "Come on, what's the worst that could happen?"

….

Not for the first time that night, Harry admired the layout of the Room of Requirement. It felt both intimate, but also private. He and Draco were sitting in one of the booths at the side of the room. No one paid them any attention in their dark corner, a fact for which Harry was grateful. Most of them were dancing now, wrapped up in the music and each other. He leaned across the table towards Draco.

"That was fun this afternoon - all of us playing poker together," he said.

"You mean, me taking all of your money," Draco retorted. Harry rolled his eyes.

"You have an amazing poker face," he said. "Where did you learn how to look so impassive?" Draco picked up his beer and took a large swig of it. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He considered Harry for a moment as if deciding how best to answer.

"Death Eater training," he said. Harry felt as though cold water had been tipped over him. Whatever he had been expecting, it was not that.

"I'm sorry what?"

"I was in training to become a Death Eater over the summer," Draco said. He stared determinedly at a spot on the booth about a foot left of Harry's head. Harry sat for a moment, dumbfounded. When he had asked, he hadn't expected such a frank answer. Suddenly the evening's trajectory had shifted and he no longer saw them surreptitiously stealing kisses in the corner, but now that the conversation had started, it couldn't be ignored.

"Don't you think that is potentially a conflict of interest?" Harry asked. He moved his head to try to fall into Draco's line of sight, but Draco flicked his eyes down to the table instead.

"Well, yes," he said to his hands.

"And that perhaps you should have told me?"

"Also yes. But in all fairness, I _did_ just tell you. It's not the easiest thing to bring up in conversation, you know."

"Fuck." Harry leaned back and ran a hand through his hair. "How do I know if I can trust you? That you're not plotting to kill me?" At this Draco lifted his eyes up to meet Harry's again. He looked incredulous.

"Harry, I-" he started to say.

"-No, I don't want to hear it," Harry snapped. He folded his arms in front of his chest.

"I can explain," Draco persisted.

"I don't want to hear any kind of explanation," he said, even though he somewhat did want an explanation now. He picked up his beer and took a large sip. The bubbles tingled as they hit the back of his throat and he forced the liquid down quickly, eyes watering. He almost felt like he should have expected this, like this was an inevitability with dating a Slytherin, or at least with dating _Malfoy_ but the betrayal still stung.

Draco sighed and put his glass down decisively on the table. "Look," he said. "If it makes you feel any better, honestly, when I agreed to go out with you, I didn't think I would like you so much."

"Gee thanks," Harry said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Then why did you agree to go on a date at all?"

"I don't know. I think my thought process went along the lines of 'fuck it, why not?'"

"Charming."

"Well, 'fuck it' turned out to be better than no."

"Maybe," Harry said. "But how do I know that you're not using me in some way? I mean, fuck, Draco, Death Eater training?" Unbidden, the image of the Dark Mark hanging sickly and green over the Quidditch World Cup sprang into Harry's mind. He shuddered.

"Just from my mum." Draco said, bringing Harry back to the present.

"So you're not actually a Death Eater then?" Harry asked.

"Don't be daft. I'm not even legal yet."

"But if you were…" Harry let the thought hang.

Draco made an exasperated noise. "What do you want me to say? That yes, if I had already turned seventeen, I would have a mark on my arm?" An involuntary spasm of disgust crossed Harry's face.

"Well would you?" he asked.

"I don't know," Draco said, so quietly that Harry almost didn't hear it over the music in the background.

"Yes, you do," Harry sneered.

"Fine, I guess, the answer would probably be yes then. But that was-"

"-I don't want to hear it."

"Please let me explain myself."

"I said I don't want to hear it." Harry picked up his beer and started to angrily scoot out of the booth.

"Merlin, Potter," Draco said. He slammed his hands down angrily on the table. "What the fuck did you expect? You know who my family are."

"I don't know what I expected, _Malfoy,"_ Harry spat back. "But it sure as hell wasn't this." And with that, he fled the booth.

* * *

Feedback, as ever, is appreciated. :D


	19. Chapter 19

Apologies for the delay on my other story - The Wizarding World is Not Enough - my beta has been really busy but he says he can hopefully get to it this week.

However this story (for better or worse) is edited by me and so I am a bit better at posting on the biweekly schedule. (If there are any errors, I apologize. I do read through it in what I hope is a thorough manner, but sometimes that's hard to do with ones own work!)

That said, if anyone feels like beta-ing this story, let me know. ;)

* * *

Harry leaned against the wall at the back of the room and brooded into his beer. Part of him thought he should be standing moodily on a balcony, huddled against the wind, perhaps smoking a cigarette, while everyone else was happy inside. He felt that might fit his aesthetic more. He thought he had seen something like that in a movie. Or maybe a television show of Dudley's. And as soon as the idea entered his mind, a door materialized next to him on the wall.

Curious, he opened it. A blast of icy October air hit him as he looked out onto a never before seen balcony that now jutted out from the side of the castle. Perfect. Now he could be properly miserable. Although, he wasn't too keen on being _that_ cold.

A coat stand appeared beside the door, laden with a variety of coats. Harry picked one at random and put it on. Then he walked outside. The wind whipped around him, its icy fingers ruffling his hair. He scrunched his shoulders against the cold and fumbled with the buttons on his coat. He looked back at the castle and saw that there was now a large, rounded window looking into the room. All the better for glancing wistfully back inside, and feeling sorry for himself that he wasn't in there enjoying the evening like everyone else. Perfect.

He walked over to the edge of the balcony and stared out over the castle's roof. He wondered if anyone had ever thought of having the Room of Requirement have a balcony before. He knew he certainly hadn't, but he should remember this for the future. The view was incredible. He rested his beer on the balcony's edge.

The wind whipped around him again and he shivered and stuffed his hands into the pocket of his coat. Or, he tried to, but found his left hand impeded by what turned out to be a packet of cigarettes. In the right hand pocket, was a book of matches. The Room had really taken his thought seriously.

Shrugging, he pulled out a cigarette, then crouched down behind the balcony wall to hide from the wind. It took him several attempts to light a match and keep it lit, but after a fumbling minute, he managed it and lit the cigarette.

He took an experimental drag on it. And immediately doubled over coughing. The back of his throat felt like it was burning, so he took deep lungfuls of cold fresh air. He stared down at the cigarette, scandalized, and then dropped it and crushed it under his foot.

He straightened up again and reached for his beer. His mouth tasted strange and he wondered what the appeal was. Perhaps he was doing something wrong, but he wasn't overly eager to figure out how to do it right. It all seemed a bit pointless. He took a long pull from his beer and swished it around his mouth. There, now he could almost convince himself the whole embarrassing incident hadn't happened. He leaned forward and rested his elbows on the edge of the balcony and stared out into the night, content to brood and be cold.

"Harry," came a voice from behind him. Harry turned. It was Ron. "What are you doing out here?" Ron was shouldering his way into one of the coats as he made his way over to Harry. Harry didn't respond.

"What's wrong, mate?" Harry shook his head. He didn't want to talk to Ron about his fight with Malfoy. He didn't want to talk to _anyone_ about that. Ron had sweat glistening on his forehead and it was clear that he had come from the dance floor. As if to confirm Harry's thoughts, Ron glanced back inside and waved at someone to continue on without him. Harry was surprised to see that someone was Pansy Parkinson. Harry's shoulder's drooped. Not for the first time did he feel incredibly grateful to have a friend like Ron, who would leave whatever good time he was having to come and check on him.

"Malfoy and I had a fight," he said. Ron turned back to face him, concern etched in his face.

"Oh no," he said. "About what?"

"Voldemort." Ron frowned.

"What about him?"

"Draco said he'd had Death Eater training."

"And?"

"What do you mean 'and'?" Harry asked. "He said he'd had _Death Eater training_ , Ron."

"Yeah, it's Malfoy. I kind of expected he'd had some Death Eater training. I mean, have you seen his dad? He's like a walking recruitment poster for skirting the lines of what's acceptable in terms of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. Or, at least he was until he got locked up in Azkaban."

"Yeah, but-"

"-And anyway, didn't you start Dumbledore's Army last year? Isn't that kind of the same thing?" Ron asked, cutting him off.

"No, that's different."

"How? You were training people in magical skills. For war and fighting and whatnot."

"But Ron," Harry cried, exasperated. "It's _Death Eater training_." Ron took a step towards Harry. He took a deep breath, as if steeling himself for what he was about to say next.

"Don't you think you're being a little unfair on him?" Harry's eyebrows shot up.

"How am I being unfair? He's in league with Voldemort."

"He is not ' _in league with Voldemort'._ He's at school, you muppet."

"Why are you defending him?"

Ron shrugged. "I don't know. I think he might actually care for you, Har'. And you know it pains me to say that. This is Malfoy after all. But you didn't see him after the incident the other day."

They both winced at the memory of the incident.

"He was so worried about you. Which Hermione and I thought was odd as seemingly you two have only been together a few days. But nevertheless, he _cared_. That doesn't seem like the kind of person who's going to just turn around and sell you out to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. At least not immediately. He'd probably do some soul searching first and…" Ron trailed off, realizing that comment was not helping the conversation.

Harry frowned, fidgeting with the glass in his hands, turning it around and around between his fingers.

"I don't know, Ron," he said at last. "I don't know what to think." Ron shrugged.

"It's none of my business, mate," he said. "But if you ask me, aside from cursing your dick off, this is the happiest I've seen you in a while. You haven't worried about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named all week."

"But perhaps that's a bad thing," Harry said.

"You think it's bad to _not_ be constantly stressed about something?"

"No, but what if I've let my guard down? Remember what Moody said - constant vigilance."

"That was Barty Crouch Jr."

"That's not the point." Harry crossed his arms and pouted. All of Ron's logic was making sense. It was infuriating.

"You're not going soft, Harry. Just because you like someone," Ron said gently. He laid a hand on Harry's arm and gave it a small squeeze.

"It's not just someone. It's Malfoy and he's a Death Eater."

"No, he's not," Ron said. "I've seen his arm."

"In training."

"Maybe." Ron sighed and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand and shivered. He pulled his coat more tightly around himself. "But he's not one at this moment, and, mate, if he's dating you, he's clearly not going to go on and join them right now, is he?" Harry frowned. "It seems like the opposite of what he'd want to do." He put on a grumpy face and did what he thought was a good impression of Draco. (It was not). "Oh, yes, Harry, I like you so much, that I think I'll go help out the guy that wants to kill you." He added a sort of shoulder shimmy and Harry couldn't help but burst out laughing.

"Maybe you're right, Ron," Harry said once he had stopped laughing and could form words again.

"I know I'm right," Ron said. "Emotional intelligence is one of my main strengths."

"Except when it comes to girls, when you have the emotional range of a teaspoon," Harry said, remembering the argument the year before with Hermione.

"I've gotten better," Ron protested. Harry grinned. He moved next to Ron and put an arm around his shoulder. Then he steered him to the edge of the balcony so that they could look out over the view together. He turned his head, expecting to see Ron's serene gaze as he looked out over the castle, but instead Ron had his nose scrunched up and was sniffing Harry.

"Harry," he said slowly. "Have you been smoking?"

"No," Harry said too quickly. Ron narrowed his eyes in suspicion and shrugged himself out from under Harry's arm. He grabbed Harry's sleeve and pulled it up to his nose.

"Yes, you have," he said. Harry's shoulders sagged.

"Not really," he protested. "I tried to but then I had a small coughing fit and I decided I didn't like it." Ron seemed mollified by this. He turned his attention to the balcony then, staring out across the dark grounds. They stood for a while in companionable silence before Ron asked,

"Where did this balcony even come from?"

"I imagined it. And it's the Room of Requirement, so it complied."

"You couldn't have imaged some sort of outdoor fireplace, could you?" He rubbed his hands together. "It's freezing out here. Why did you even want to be outside? It's October."

"Uh." Harry wasn't sure how to answer this as he thought Ron might find his explanation of wanting to sulk properly a bit silly. "I wanted to get away for a bit," he said. "But I also still wanted to be at the party." Ron nodded slowly.

"That's fair. Are you going to come back in soon? Because I can't take much more of this cold." He lifted his hands to his face and blew on them. Harry shook his head.

"Go back inside," he said. "I'll join you in a bit."

…

Inside, Draco sat alone at the bar. Well, he wasn't strictly alone. He had a bottle of whisky for company. He would occasionally tip the bottle sideways and fill his tumbler with a measure of liquor, which he then nursed. He didn't know what else to do with himself. He didn't want to leave, because everyone was here having fun, but he also didn't want to have fun, because he and Harry might have just broken up and it hurt, damn it. So he sat at the bar, resting his elbows on the table, grinding his teeth, and drinking.

He wished he hadn't brought up the summer. It was stupid of him to bring it up now. But he had also felt like he had been lying to Harry by omission and he hadn't wanted that either. Because, he realized with a jolt, he really liked Harry.

He sighed and took a sip of his whisky. That complicated things. Because what he had _not_ mentioned to Harry, was that thing he had to do. He hadn't mentioned it to anyone really. Sure, Vince and Greg knew that _something_ was up, but they weren't sure what. In all fairness, in the two months he had been back at school, he hadn't come up with any solutions to his task anyway.

Perhaps he could just write to his mother and tell her he couldn't do it. But with his father in Azkaban, _he_ was the man of the house and _he_ needed to protect his mother. And to protect his mother, he needed to do what the Dark Lord had asked him to do. Even if he didn't know how. And even if now, he really didn't want to. He wondered if he could just tell the Death Eaters that the cabinets were irrevocably broken. For all he knew, they actually were. Perhaps he could even "accidentally" break them even more on the pretense of fixing them.

And then what? Fuck. He was too young to be doing any of this. But then, this was the age his parents had been when they joined up. Except, aside from Greg and Vince, none of Draco's friends were looking to join the Death Eaters after school, so he felt like he was under less peer pressure then they had been. Most of his friends talked about all the normal things they were going to do when they graduated in two years. And quite suddenly, that was all that Draco wanted to do. Be normal.

For that, he would need help. And he thought the best way get help was to tell Harry everything. And hope that they all came out of this alive.

Now where did that idiot brunet get to?


	20. Chapter 20

Draco looked around the room but could not spot Harry anywhere. But he did see Ron, who was coming back through a door that Draco hadn't noticed before. He watched as the redhead took off a coat and hung it by the door. And that was when Draco noticed the window. He shook his head, trying to clear some of the whisky out of it. How had he missed the window? It took up most of the wall.

And there in the window, framed in moonlight, was Harry. Bingo.

Draco swung his legs around and clambered off of his bar stool. He swayed slightly as he tried to gain his balance. He glared at the bottle of whisky that was still sitting on the bar. It was the whisky's fault he was so tipsy. But liquid courage was what he needed, so he grabbed the bottle by the neck and walked over to the door.

Opening the door, he noticed vaguely that it was cold outside. Perhaps he should wear one of the coats that were hanging on the rack where Ron had placed his. That would probably be the smart thing to do. And Draco was pretty sure he was smart. He pulled a coat off of the rack at random and stuffed one arm into it before swinging it around and attempting to put the other sleeve on. With a small amount of hopping in a circle, he managed it. He picked up the whisky bottle again and walked outside.

Harry did not turn around at the sound of the door.

"Seriously, Ron," he said. "Go have fun."

"I'm not the Weasel," Draco said. He was decently sure that he was not slurring his words. At the very least, he was trying his very hardest not to slur them.

"No," Harry said. He turned to face Draco and crossed his arms in front of his chest. "You're the Ferret." Draco burst out laughing. Harry frowned at him. They had just had an argument. Why was Draco so carefree?

And then he spotted the bottle of whisky in his hands and he understood. He pointed at it.

"May I have some?" he asked. Draco shrugged and made his way across the balcony to Harry.

"Sure." He held out the bottle and Harry took it. He unscrewed the top and took a swig. He made a face, but swallowed the mouthful. He handed it back to Draco.

"What are you doing out here?" Draco asked. He looked around the space for some sort of chair, and, finding none, slid down the half wall of the balcony and sat on the floor with his knees bent before him. There was a small popping noise and a small furniture set materialized in the corner. Draco sighed dramatically and dragged himself back to his feet before sitting down heavily on the nearest seat, which happened to be a loveseat.

There was another small pop and a fireplace inserted itself against the wall of the castle. A fire sprang up in the grate. "Let me rephrase," Draco said, settling himself properly in his seat. "What are you doing out here aside from decorating the place?" Harry gave a small snort of laughter. Draco decided that was a good sign. He couldn't be _too_ angry with Draco if he could still find him funny, right?

"I was sulking," Harry said. He walked over to where Draco was sitting and flopped down into one of the chairs. "And brooding. And generally trying to give off an air of misery."

"And you figured you could be more miserable if you were out in the cold?"

"Finally, someone who understands me." Draco shrugged.

"It's the kind of melodramatic thing I would do," he said.

"Oh," Harry said, nodding slowly. Melodramatic hadn't been the effect he had been going for. They sat in silence for a long moment. Harry drained the last of his beer. Draco stared into the fireplace. Presently, Harry leaned forward to take the whisky bottle again. Draco snapped out of his reverie and handed it over.

"Look," he said. "I'm sorry that I didn't tell you about the whole Death Eater training thing earlier." Harry said nothing, only grunted and took a swig of whisky. "I wasn't sure how to bring it up earlier. And maybe this wasn't the best time, but I wanted to be honest with you while I had the courage to do it."

"You mean while you were drunk enough?"

"Same difference." Draco waved the comment aside and Harry cracked a small smile. "Either way, the point was that I was trying to be open with you. And I think that should get some credit." Harry said nothing, just stared at Draco. "Or not? Merlin, Potter you can be difficult sometimes, you know that?" Draco turned away, crossed his arms and glowered at the fire, his mouth twisted in annoyance. He was surprised, therefore, when he felt the loveseat cushion sink as Harry sat down beside him.

"I'm sorry," the brunet said. "I overreacted."

"You're what?" Draco asked.

"Don't make me say it again."

"No, really, you're what? I missed it." There was a smirk on Draco's face that told Harry he was joking, but nevertheless, he said,

"I'm sorry." He reached over and took Draco's hand. "Now, don't get me wrong, this conversation isn't over. I want you to tell me more about this Death Eater nonsense, but not right now. Because right now, I just want to kiss you."

And so he did, inelegantly leaning forward and pressing their lips together. Draco kissed him eagerly for a moment before pulling back. He glanced nervously at the large window against the wall, but there was no one looking out. He turned back to Harry.

"Have you been smoking?" he asked. Harry flushed and turned away.

"Not really," he mumbled. "I barely had any of it."

"Was it supposed to be part of the melodrama?"

"Possibly." Draco sighed and took Harry's hand.

"You're a special one," he said, twining their fingers together. He wanted desperately to lean against Harry and snuggle up to him in front of the fire, but he was painfully aware of how easy it would be for anyone to look out and see them. He wasn't even sure he should be holding Harry's hand, but he wanted the feel of Harry's skin on his. So he'd decided _fuck it._ He had decided _fuck it_ a lot recently, it seemed. He needed to be more careful. Hell, _they_ needed to be more careful.

Harry shifted beside him and Draco turned to look at him. He wasn't sure what to say. Starting conversations never seemed to come as easily to Draco as they did to, say, his mother. He tried to think what she might say in this situation and the idea was so laughable that he actually snorted. Harry looked at him, his brow furrowed, and asked,

"What is it?" And Draco didn't know what to say, so he just shook his head.

"Nothing. I'm just drunk." Harry nodded.

"I think we're all drunk. I mean, Ron must be or he wouldn't be dancing right now."

"Mm, yes, I did notice that there had been quite a large contingent of people on the dance floor in there. Somehow I didn't want to join them."

"You don't like to dance?" Harry asked.

"Oh, I love to dance. But up until about five minutes ago, all I wanted to do was sulk and drink whisky."

"Well, then I'm jolly glad you've stopped sulking."

"Still wouldn't want to dance though." Harry cocked his head to the side and stared at Draco, hoping his eyes were asking enough of a question. "Well, the only person I would want to dance with is out here feeling sorry for himself."

"I'm not feeling sorry for myself anymore," Harry said. He stroked the back of Draco's hand idly with his thumb. "You're here. And we're not arguing."

"For now," Draco said darkly, but as Harry stared at him his face relaxed into a small smile. "But either way, it's not like we can just go in there and start dancing together. At least, not the way I would want to dance with you."

"Oh? And how would that be?"

"Well, let's just say, it would quite certainly give away the fact that we're going out."

"Would you call this going out?" Harry asked. Draco frowned at him.

"I don't know what else I would call it. You asked me out on a date and I accepted."

"So does that make you my boyfriend then?" Harry asked. A smile played around his lips.

"I thought that much was obvious. But perhaps you're more dense than I had originally thought."

"Draco you wound me."

"Shall I kiss you and make it better?"

"While I would like that, I'm worried about-" Harry gestured towards the window. Draco scowled at it. Then he looked around the rest of the seating area and pointed to a chair in the corner, next to the fireplace.

"I don't think we would be seen from there," he said. He stood up and walked over to the chair. "What do you think?" He leaned forward to stare around the fireplace. "It seems quite hidden."

"Good," Harry said, standing up. "Because I really fucking want to kiss you." He stood up and crossed the space in two steps and then practically threw himself on top of Draco, straddling him. He leaned down kissed him. Gently at first and then with more fervor. He felt Draco's hand come up and tangle into his hair and in response, Harry kissed him more greedily. They were pressed together now and Harry felt too hot in his coat. He unbuttoned the front and immediately Draco thrust his freezing hands inside. Harry shivered and pulled the blond closer.

All thoughts of their argument were gone from his head. There would be time to discuss this supposed Death Eater training later. Ron was right. Draco Malfoy made him happy and right now, that was all that mattered.

…

Ron had not gone immediately back to the dance floor after he'd left Harry. Rather, he had sauntered over to the bar area and poured himself a glass of water in an attempt to be sensible. He sat, back against the wood of the bar and elbows propped up behind him, sipping at the water and watching the rest of the sixth years.

Ernie MacMillen was in what appeared to be a dance off with Michael Corner, and the rest of the students had created a large circle around them. Ron's mouth quirked up in amusement as he watched Ernie drop to the floor before springing back up again. The Hufflepuff clearly had hidden depths. Corner, not to be outdone, was moving his his back and forth in a way Ron assumed he thought looked attractive.

After a few minutes of this, Michael was thrust aside by Pansy, who began to dance in earnest. There were a few loud whoops from the crowd and she smirked around at them as she swung her hips around in a circle. Ron's heart caught in his throat as she looked straight at him across the room and raised an eyebrow. He gulped, his mouth suddenly dry, and quickly took a gulp of water.

She continued to stare at him as she danced closer to Ernie, her moves getting progressively more racy. Ron felt his face redden. He wished she would look away, but at the same time, he knew he would be sad if she did.

He pushed himself off of his stool and put his now empty glass down. Then he walked with purpose towards the dance floor. He elbowed his way into the middle and pushed an exhausted Ernie to the fringes of the circle.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Hermione watching him with interest, but he ignored her. He only had eyes for Pansy and her hips. They met together in the middle of the circle.

She took his hands and placed one on her hip and held the other out. Before he could protest, she began leading him in some sort of fast dance, where he mostly seemed to stand still while she moved around him. And it was like she projected the dance moves into his brain, because he barely thought about what he was doing - he just moved with her and with the music.

The circle of people dissolved slowly back into dancing couples, but Ron and Pansy continued to dance, ignoring the others around them. Ron dipped Pansy backwards, her back arching over his arms, and then pulled her back up until they were face to face again. They paused there, both of them breathing hard, for half a second, before Ron closed the gap and kissed her.

* * *

Reviews and feedback are always appreciated :) (particularly when I'm looking for inspiration)


	21. Chapter 21

Pansy pulled back and slapped him. Hard. Ron stood, blinking dumbly.

"What was that for?" he asked.

"I could ask the same thing of you," Pansy snapped back.

"I thought that was what you wanted."

"Well, clearly it wasn't," she said, although it had kind of been what she had wanted.

She had a reputation to uphold. She couldn't go around kissing Gryffindors. Dancing, sure, that was a whole different Quidditch pitch. But kissing? What would her mother say?

Or, more likely, what would Draco say? And for that matter, where _was_ Draco? She pulled further back from Ron and looked around, but she couldn't see his shiny blond head anywhere. This was odd as he was usually so easy to spot in a crowd. She leaned in and yelled into Ron's ear over the music.

"Have you seen Draco?" She felt rather than saw his shoulders shrug.

"He's probably outside with Harry," came Ron's reply.

"Outside?" Ron started to explain, but then shook his head and took her arm, leading her out of the crowded dance floor and over to the side of the room. He pointed at a door set into the wall next to a large, arched window that Pansy was decently sure had not been there earlier in the evening. She could see an outdoor furniture set, bathed in warm, orange light from what she assumed was a fireplace. She reached for the door handle, but Ron put a hand on her arm, stopping her.

"What?" she snapped, whirling around.

"It's October," he said simply. "You might want a coat." And he reached over and pulled a coat off of the coat rack beside him and held it out to her. She accepted it with an apologetic smile. She swung it around her shoulders and then opened the door and stepped out into the night.

She shut the door gently behind herself and looked around, taking in the balcony with its stellar view of the Hogwarts grounds, its warm, inviting fireplace, and-.

And.

And The-Boy-Who-Lived quite aggressively making out with Draco Malfoy. Her jaw dropped.

"-Pansy, wait for me," Ron's voice came from behind her as the offending redhead stepped out onto the balcony as well. The door slammed shut behind him. Harry and Draco sprang guiltily apart wearing matching deer in the wand-light expressions. Ron cringed at the look of shock on Pansy's face.

"I can explain," Draco said, pushing Harry off of himself and standing up. Harry stumbled slightly at the push but then gained his balance and stood next to Draco.

"I don't really think there's much need," she said, frowning. "You two were playing tonsil Quidditch. I'm not blind." Draco and Harry looked at each other.

"Guilty as charged," Harry said.

"Ah, crap," Pansy said. "This means I owe Blaise two galleons. I had bet this would happen much farther into the term." She walked over to the seating area in front of the fire and threw herself down into one of the chairs. Ron, after a moment's hesitation, joined them as well, and Harry and Draco sat back down, albeit on separate seats.

"So how long has this been going on for?" Pansy asked, pointing back and forth between Harry and Draco. She picked up a strand of hair and began idly playing with it. "Draco, I thought you had turned him down when he asked you out on Sunday."

"I did," Draco said. "But then he brewed a love potion first thing Monday morning and asked again." Pansy cocked her head to the side.

"So you're infatuated with him? Well, that would explain it."

"No, I didn't _drink_ the love potion. We made it together during class and, well, he asked again and I thought _fuck it_."

"Ah yes," Pansy drawled. "The way all good love stories start." She spotted the bottle of whisky on the table and leaned forward to snatch it up. "May I?"

Draco nodded and Pansy popped the top off. She threw her head back and took what Ron thought was an impressively long swig from it. When she placed it back on the table, he picked it up. After the slap on the face, he was feeling less sure of himself, but as the whisky burned its way down his throat, he thought he felt more of the liquid courage kick in again.

"Wait," Pansy continued. "Didn't you send Potter to the hospital wing yesterday?"

"It's complicated," Harry said.

"They were trying to keep the relationship a secret," Ron added. Pansy snorted in amusement.

"Right," she said. "Because when _I'm_ in a secret relationship, I just snog people in the middle of a party." Ron felt his face burn at the mention of kissing. He took another quick swig of the whisky.

"Please don't tell anyone," Draco said quietly. "My father-"

"-Yes, yes, your father would disown you." Pansy waved Draco's comment away. "Your secret is safe with me. But you need to get your shit together. No staring at each other across the Great Hall, you muppets."

"Yeah," Ron agreed. "I know subtlety isn't your strongest suit, Harry, but you really need to work on it."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Harry spluttered.

"Har'," Ron said gently. "There's a reason that you have a scar that reads 'I must not tell lies'."

"But I wasn't lying."

"That's not the point," Pansy snapped. "Just act like you hate each other and no one will suspect a thing." Draco's mouth twisted in thought.

"What if we just told people we were friends?" he asked. Pansy shrugged and crossed her arms in front of her chest.

"Sure. I guess we can be friends with the Gryffindorks."

"Pans," Draco said. "We _are_ friends with the Gryffindors. We've been hanging out all day."

Pansy rolled her eyes but didn't argue. Her eyes flicked briefly over to Ron before returning to Draco and she realized that perhaps she had been unfair on him earlier.

But she hadn't wanted him to kiss her, so he had deserved the slap.

Although, at the same time, she had wanted him to. Though she was pretty sure that was just the alcohol talking. What she really needed was spend time doing some introspection once she was sober this weekend.

Because it wasn't just a Gryffindork, it was a _Weasley_. And normally she stayed well away from redheads. (Her mother had always told her they were worse than Muggle-borns - but then, Muggle-borns weren't actually that bad either and was everything her mother had told her wrong?) Perhaps Draco was right. Perhaps she should just say _fuck it_. But then look where that got him.

"Hello?" The offending blond was speaking to her. "Earth to Pansy."

"What?" she snapped.

"Harry asked if you might want to join us in Hogsmeade this weekend." She frowned.

"It's not a Hogsmeade weekend."

"And yet, Harry took me to the Three Broomsticks on Tuesday." Her eyebrows shot up. Glancing over at Ron, she noticed he was grinning at her surprise. She turned her glance into a glare.

"Seriously?" she asked Draco.

"Seriously."

"Well, shit, why not?"

"Great," Ron said. "It's a date."

"It's not a date."

"Not what I meant," he said, almost too quickly.

"Is Granger coming?"

"Yes," Draco said. "And I thought we would invite Blaise as well."

"Well thank fuck for that." She gestured at Ron. "Now give me that bottle back."

…

Hermione had been both surprised and not surprised to see Ron kiss Pansy. She had been dancing in a group with Blaise, Ernie, Neville and Padma, but had kept sneaking glances over to the pair of them because their dancing was so electric, she could hardly help herself. She _had_ been surprised when Pansy had slapped him a second later. But, really, she hadn't been all that surprised at that either.

She felt oddly possessive of Ron. How could she not? They had been best friends since they had all started at Hogwarts. And, in the way of any teenage girl who is friends with a boy, she had briefly thought about them dating. She'd had similar thoughts about Harry, but that was clearly never going to happen.

At the same time, though, she knew she was being unreasonable. Ron could kiss whoever he wanted to, even if she was a Slytherin.

And so, for that matter, could she. Not that she particularly wanted to kiss Ernie, with whom she was somehow dancing. She looked around, trying to figure out how he had maneuvered his way out of their group and gotten her alone. She spotted Blaise over Ernie's shoulder and made a wide eyed face at him.

He took the hint and made his way around the Hufflepuff. Once he was next to her, he reached an arm over to her and pulled her into a twirl, before putting his arms protectively around her. As they side shuffled slowly away, Hermione saw Ernie shrug and join another group of dancers.

"Thank you," Hermione shouted into Blaise's ear.

"Don't mention it. That's what potions partners do for each other," he said. She laughed and lifted his arm up to make him twirl her again.

…

Seamus was having a good time. Granted, there weren't many evenings when he _didn't_ have a good time, but still this night ranked highly. And the Room of Requirement had a lot to do with that. He had always known in the back of his mind that it was a good place for shenanigans, but he had never quite realized the potential until he watched Harry create an outdoor balcony out of nothing, while he was still in the room.

And so Seamus had asked the room for some dark corners, for doing dark deeds. The room had complied, even adding curtains to obscure the corners further. Thus, when his dancing with Justin began to edge towards the more risqué, he took the other man by the hand and led him over to the corner where they were now making out.

Now, if only there were a bed.

There was a small popping noise and a door appeared behind Justin's back. Seamus grinned into the kisses and reached around to turn the door knob.

Perfect.

* * *

I am so sorry this is late. We went to London for the Thanksgiving vacation time (and went on the Harry Potter Studio tour which was amaaaazing) and I'm only just getting back to my normal schedule. Should be back to normal now!

Feedback, as ever, is appreciated :D


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